Time and Time Again
by Secret Agent G
Summary: It's Perry and Doof's Neme-Versary! Until a time machine goes wrong and Perry gets transported to the future, that is. In this strange, twisted reality, old friends have made new enemies- and old enemies might just become new friends. POST ATSD
1. NemeVersary Surprises

**Author's Notes: **Hi, everybody, and welcome to the newly remastered first chapter of Time and Time Again! As of June first, 2013, I'll be reuploading and reworking all the previous chapters, and then on the fourth, I'm releasing the final chapter! ^^

The major changes that have been made are actually not so major. The main plot is still about the same, and most of the dialogue and stuff, so there's not that many differences. I mostly just fixed up the narration and added in adjectives and stuff. xD

Additionally, guess what? The fourth isn't just a random date I chose to release the story on- it's actually the two-year anniversary of the story! And that makes it fun.

So without further ado, I present to you: Time and Time Again! :3

* * *

><p>The story I will tell you is extensive in length, and just as complicated. It is a convoluted tale that spans many years and is tucked away in the folds of time, unknown to all but those who lived through it. By the time you get through with it, you may wonder how it can even exist…but heck, it's long enough already without the intro. Let's get started, shall we?<p>

Our tale begins on an ordinary summer day…

**TIME AND TIME AGAIN**

_A Phineas and Ferb fan fiction by Secret Agent G_

Some say morning is the most beautiful time of day, and that morning, you could really see why. The sun shone with a bright radiance, amongst a setting of clouds that came straight out of an oil painting and a powder blue sky. The trees beneath it glittered with morning dew in the light, and birds could be heard singing sweetly all around. A soft wind blew waves through the seas of grass in the fields and swept a few stray leaves into the sky, soaring even higher than the birds. It was a lovely morning in Danville indeed…and two stepbrothers were about to make the most of it.

Phineas and Ferb were currently asleep in their beds, their alarm clocks reading 6:59. But they'd be up and about, doing what they did best, once the time officially switched to 7:00…

Or, perhaps even a little earlier.

Sure enough, as the sun peeked in through the closed blinds, Phineas opened his eyes just an inch, roused by the birdsong outside his window. Then, seeing that morning had arrived, he sat straight up in bed, followed quickly by Ferb, who had apparently woken up at exactly the same time. Glancing over at the clock, he turned it off just as the time switched to 7:00 and grinned triumphantly.

"Haha!" His laugh showed no sign of tiredness, only excitement for the coming day. "The alarm couldn't even go off! We're just too fast, Ferb."

In the other bed, Ferb gave one of his slight smiles, along with a quick nod. Ferb wasn't one for big reactions, but the small motion was more than enough for his brother.

Phineas stretched his arms and yawned widely, then reached down to lay a hand on Perry's side. "Good morning, Perry! And I do mean that- today is gonna be great!"

At the sound of the words, the platypus stirred, opening one eye with an almost lazy air to look up at his master. A rumbling purr entwined itself with the gentle rise and fall of his breathing, and with a giggle, Phineas began to pet him.

He glanced back over at Ferb. "So, ready to create the most awesome role-playing game ever?" he asked eagerly. Ferb gave the thumbs up, but he hesitated. Sensing something, Phineas hesitated too. There was something strange in the air today…something tense. Exciting. The kind of thing that one couldn't quite define.

"Hmm…" Phineas murmured thoughtfully. "Ferb, do you know what today is? 'Cause I don't."

Ferb answered promptly, "It's Tuesday."

Phineas glanced at the calendar, not to confirm if this was true, but to check whether there was anything else special about the day. There wasn't. "Well, that's odd," he mused with a little tilt of the head. "With the electrified atmosphere today, it just seems like there's something going on…something big."

Beneath his gently massaging fingers, Perry tensed suddenly and briefly. _Something big! _He had almost forgotten…

However, Phineas didn't notice this, and he merely shrugged and returned to his usual smile. "Maybe we're just going to do something really cool today, and we're already excited for it without even knowing what it is!" he said cheerfully. "Come on, Ferb, let's go!"

And the two of them zipped downstairs for breakfast, a newly invigorated Perry hot on their heels.

* * *

><p>A while later, after they had cleared the plates from breakfast, the boys headed out to the backyard with Perry in tow. Almost as soon as they had sat down underneath the tall, shady tree that served as their usual place of resting, Ferb pulled a sheet of blueprints out from his pocket and showed them to Phineas. The redhead grinned eagerly at the sight of them, eyes sparkling with excitement.<p>

"This is great, Ferb!" he exclaimed happily. "We really are gonna have the coolest role playing game ever! We can have swords and shields, and our own armies, and we can battle evil overlords! And Isabella can be a ninja, and Buford can be a Viking like he said he wanted to be, and we can even make Perry a warrior!" he picked the platypus up and moved his arms around playfully, as if he were throwing punches. "Ha! Hi-ya!"

Perry chattered in protest, although he did nothing to extricate himself from Phineas' grip, and the boy quickly set him back down. "In short, it'll be great," he confirmed cheerfully. As he and Ferb began to discuss the details of the plan, Perry wandered away discreetly in the direction of the house, slipping in through the back door before either boy could notice.

"So, let's get started!" Phineas exclaimed, leaping out of his seat excitedly. Suddenly, he paused and glanced around his feet at the grass below. "Hey, where'd Perry go?"

"Maybe he didn't feel like being a warrior," Ferb suggested quietly.

Phineas nodded, a little deflated. "Well, he is a platypus. They don't do much."

* * *

><p>Inside the house, Perry had ambled into the living room. There he waited for a moment, glancing around surreptitiously to see if anyone was watching. Then he crept over to the rug in the center of the room and crawled underneath, leaving no trace of having been there except for a small lump in the center. But even that abruptly disappeared, as a panel opened up beneath his feet and he dropped in.<p>

Moments later in his underground lair, the platypus agent promptly dropped out of a chute in the ceiling and landed in his chair, looking quite irritated. On the ride down, he had gotten covered in bits of dust and dirt from crawling under the rug, and it was rather itchy. As he adjusted himself in the seat and tried to brush himself off, the telescreen above him turned on with a flash of static, displaying the ever-serious face of Major Monogram, who looked businesslike as usual.

"Good morning, Agent P- oh, my," he paused mid-sentence and winced when he saw Perry's sordid condition. Perry only scowled in annoyance, crossing his arms reproachfully.

Monogram frowned uncomfortably. "We were going to have that entrance cleaned yesterday, but it looks like _someone _forgot…and by someone, I mean _Carl._"

"Hey!" came Carl's nasally voice from off-screen. "That is so unfair!"

"I told you it was a bad idea to make an entrance under the rug if you didn't want to clean it," Monogram continued, ignoring his intern's protests. "Well, anyway…on to your mission, Agent P."

Perry was too busy brushing himself off to salute, but he did look back up at the screen expectantly. Monogram hadn't yet mentioned anything about what today was, but he couldn't possibly have forgotten…could he? Wasn't he going to mention it at all?

However, if Monogram knew what special occasion Perry was thinking of, he didn't show it- he just launched right into the mission briefing without a second thought.

"So, Dr. Doofenshmirtz is up to his usual nonsense," he continued gruffly, reading the information off of a sheet of paper. "He's bought up a huge supply of titanium, and has checked out a few dozen library books regarding the time-space continuum. Recently, our spy cameras picked up a video of him putting together some very complicated-looking machinery. It looks just diabolical!"

As he spoke, a video of Doofenshmirtz holding a soccer-ball-sized lump of wires and metal flashed across the screen. "Even worse," Monogram continued, "all the books he rented haven't been returned yet, and he's at least a week late! This could be anything but good."

As if to illustrate his point, the thing Doofenshmirtz was holding promptly exploded. Perry's eyebrows went up.

"So anyway, we need you to get out there and stop him," concluded the major. "Good luck, Agent P."

Perry was a little disappointed, but he saluted crisply anyway. And with that, the screen went blank.

But, as soon as he was alone, he let out a small sigh. So Monogram had forgotten. Ah, well, it didn't concern him anyway, and Perry supposed it didn't really matter whether he recognized the day or not. He got up from the chair and wandered over to the wall of the lair, where a small calendar with a picture of a fedora on it hung. Studying the calendar carefully, he soon found what Phineas and Ferb's calendar lacked- a handwritten reminder of the special occasion that today represented. With a smile, Perry looked over the note that he himself had put down on the square area- _'Neme-Versary with Doof'_.For today was, indeed, the anniversary of the very day he had met Doofenshmirtz all that time ago. With a fond smile, he recalled the first battle he had ever had with his nemesis, in which he had gotten into a foosball match to the death, dropped Doofenshmirtz into a truck full of cuppy-cakes, and- oddly enough- saved his enemy's life. Ah, good times. Weird times, but good nonetheless.

Then, leaving the calendar, he headed back to the telescreen and opened a drawer on the button-covered dashboard. Inside was a small plastic package, containing a single, jauntily-frosted cupcake. The label on the plastic read, _Cuppy-Cake Pastries_, and it brought back many memories, causing Perry to smile to himself again. He was perfectly aware that his nemesis _hated_ the pastries (the same way he hated a good deal of other things), which was exactly why he planned to give it to him- as a joke, of course. After all, it was practically written in the job description that he had to irritate his enemy at every given chance. And even if he didn't _have_ to, it was just so irresistible sometimes…

Perry took a nearby marker and scribbled a quick note on the cuppy-cake's packaging. Satisfied, he pattered off toward the lair exit, where he picked up a retractable hang glider that had been left for him there. He had no idea how the agency had managed to build such a thing, but it was extremely useful.

Especially when taking the fun way to work.

* * *

><p><em>Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated!<em>

"At last, it is finished!" Doofenshmirtz announced to his mostly-empty lab, stepping back to admire his work with a wide grin pulling at his lips. The all-important, incredibly amazing, dastardly devious project which he, Doctor Heinz Doofenshmirtz, had worked so long and hard on…done!

The device he had just finished building looked like something out of a science fiction movie- flashing lights, sound effects, and all. It was a large, cylinder-shaped apparatus with an electronic door that you could open and close with a push of a button, operated through a control pad on the side. Inside, the machine was mostly blank, except for the floor, which would light up like a floodlight when activated. The machine was just over Doofenshmirtz's height and a little wider than Norm- and though the appearance was certainly very impressive, even more impressive was the actual function. This machine was capable of a huge feat, one that had never been done in the history of evil science (well, except for that Xavier Onassis guy, but he didn't count). Doofenshmirtz had titled it the 'Time Transporter-Inator'- and, as the name implied, it was capable of transporting objects through time.

Dun dun _duuun._

"And now," continued the doctor, rubbing his hands together eagerly, "I can embark on my diabolical scheme to go back in time and do…" here he paused awkwardly and allowed the sentence to trail off. "…Something."

The truth of the matter was, he didn't exactly _have _a plan yet- the machine still needed to be tested before he could use it on himself, anyway, and he had yet to think of an actual scheme to use it for. Worse yet, Perry the Platypus would surely arrive soon. With any luck, he would be late, and the doctor would get an extra minute or two.

"Well, might as well test it. I can't do anything else until that's finished, anyway- and I'm sure I can think of _something _to use it for in the meantime," he told himself, choosing to ignore the fact that he really didn't have anything to use it for (Heinz always liked to look on the bright side when it came to his evil schemes). To properly calibrate the machine, he had to test it with an inanimate object and a living creature- the former being a coin that he pulled from his pocket eagerly. Money in hand, he left for the other end of the room to pick up the second subject, which happened to be a furiously squeaking lab rat. Grinning in anticipation, he placed the test subjects inside the machine and closed the door as quick as he could (the lab rat was a real escape artist, and he wasn't taking any chances). The device lit up as he adjusted the coordinates and played with the options, making sure not to waste a moment. If all went well, the machine would activate at the next point in time available, which he assumed would be in eight minutes or so (for some reason, the whole time travel thing went by eights- you could get transported anywhere between eight minutes and eight decades into the future if you weren't careful). That meant the test would be over soon, which was good, because Perry the Platypus-

_**CRASH!**_

Oh. Well, that was probably him.

Whipping around, Doofenshmirtz saw the window at the far end of the room shatter into a thousand slivers of glass, and who should come diving through it sleekly but Perry himself, hang glider drifting down behind him outside the window. He rolled neatly as he hit the floor and landed in a defensive posture with one knee on the ground, glaring at the doctor as if he had just committed some incredibly heinous act (which, of course, he was about to).

"Ah, Perry the Platypus," Doofenshmirtz sneered, gazing down at his nemesis with a sinister air. "You're right on _time_, as usual…and yet, you're still too late!" And with a devious grin, he pulled a remote control from his pocket and activated today's trap, which in this case was a large grandfather clock that fell from the ceiling. Perry instinctively covered his head and ducked, but to no avail- the clock-turned-trap landed around him like a very fancy cage, and when he looked back up, he found himself trapped inside the cabinet, the pendulum swinging lazily behind him. Doofenshmirtz broke into a maniacal cackle, thrilled with his small success, and Perry rolled his eyes. Recently, these traps were just getting crazier and crazier.

"So, you like the trap?" Doofenshmirtz asked conversationally. "It goes along with my scheme today. Speaking of which, I bet you're wondering just what it is, huh?"

He waited for a response of some kind from the platypus, but all Perry did was stare the doctor down expectantly, waiting for him to make a move. In the short silence, Doofenshmirtz couldn't help but notice that there seemed to be something different about his inscrutable nemesis today…was it his hat? No. His fur? No…he looked just the same as always. Whatever it was, it wasn't physical. He could only describe it as some kind of excited aura- like his nemesis was eagerly anticipating something big that might happen any minute. The doctor wracked his brain, trying to think of a suitable reason for this, but nothing came to mind. Maybe Perry had just had one too many cups of coffee. Or maybe he was really excited about the scheme! But no, he didn't know what it was yet, so that couldn't be it…

Ah, the scheme! Yes, he had to get on with it. He was sure Perry's strange excitement could wait to be explained. "Okay, I'm going to take your silence as a sign of curiosity," Doofenshmirtz continued. "So, I may as well tell you what my evil plan is before I ultimately decide whether to use it to destroy you." (Which, come to think of it, was a pretty good use for the machine.)

And he swept one arm toward the machine with a grand air, grinning in excitement. "Behold, the Time Transporter-Inator! It, uh…transports stuff through time."

Perry's expression changed from an expectant stare to a condescending glare in the blink of an eye, and Doofenshmirtz scowled in response. "Well, don't look at me like that!" he protested. "No evil scientist has ever done it before, and besides, I felt like doing something big today!" Then he paused, considering that. "Granted, I can't actually remember _why _I wanted to do something big today…not that it was just random, either! I had some important reason, but now I can't remember."

Suddenly, Perry's glare shifted into an expression of immense shock, and then reserved disappointment. How could Doofenshmirtz, his own nemesis, forget their Neme-Versary? He must have known earlier, but now it seemed to have slipped his mind entirely.

Doofenshmirtz blinked, confused. "What?" he asked. "What's that look for? Was it something I said? I mean, it's not like…" he struggled for something to say, probably wondering why Perry looked so let down all of a sudden. Finally, he growled in frustration and turned back to the machine. "Look, whatever. The point is, I have to test it before I use it on anybody. If it works without blowing anything up, then it's safe to use. And if it goes horribly wrong, then I'll just use it on you instead!" And, grinning excitedly in anticipation of either result, the evil scientist turned his back on Perry and strode back to his machine.

In his trap, Perry sighed. It was bad enough that Doofenshmirtz had forgotten their Neme-Versary, and it was even worse that he planned to use a potentially disastrous time machine on him. If now wasn't a good time to escape, Perry didn't know what was- and maybe after that, he'd give Doofenshmirtz that Cuppy-Cake in the hope that it would jog his memory.

"And now, Perry the Platypus," said Doofenshmirtz as he reached the control pad of the Time Transporter-Inator, "you will witness the chronological capacity of this creatively complex contraption!" he paused there and laughed briefly, a normal laugh that indicated he had tried to make a joke. "You see what I did there? With the whole alliteration thing? Yeah, and I called it 'chronological' 'cause it's…heh, y'know…"

Perry just crossed his arms and glared, unimpressed. Gradually, the doctor realized that Perry wasn't laughing, or even smiling, and his laughter died down. "Ahh, never mind."

Then, with an eager flourish, he pressed the last key and stepped back, both he and Perry watching as the machine fired up. For a moment, it did nothing more than light up and beep loudly, but before long, it was humming and shaking unsteadily, letting out flashes of light from inside the now-closed off chamber. Then, there was a huge flash and a terrified squeak from the lab rat, and the nemeses shielded their eyes. When the light cleared, Doofenshmirtz opened the door eagerly, to see that both the coin and the rat had disappeared. He grinned, evidently pleased by this success.

"You see, Perry the Platypus?" he exclaimed proudly, turning to face his nemesis with a triumphant air. "It works! Now, they should be back in eight minutes or so, assuming I programmed it right. That's the minimum amount of time. The maximum is…well, actually, I don't know. It's eight something. Hours, days, you get the idea. I haven't actually tested _that _yet."

Perry raised an eyebrow, wondering why the whole system seemed to go by eights. It seemed a bit unnecessary and eccentric; but, then again, 'unnecessary' and 'eccentric' were the perfect two words to describe Doofenshmirtz and his methods.

In any case, no matter how crazy he was, Doofenshmirtz couldn't possibly expect him to stay put for eight whole minutes; most battles barely lasted eleven, and at least half of that was just the scheme presentation.

He turned in a circle, inspecting the clock-trap. The walls didn't look too tough- just your typical breakable wood, no match whatsoever for Perry's wall-breaking skills- but if he tried to break through, the entire clock might collapse. Instead, Perry directed his attention to the roof of the clock, which supported the pendulum swinging behind him. He could use that to get out…it seemed like it would hold under his negligible weight. But how to get there? It was much taller than him, and he doubted he could jump that high.

Then something caught his eye- a large, round, gently swinging something that led straight to his escape. He smiled as an escape plan formed in his mind, because he knew it would work. Without further hesitation, he crouched briefly before springing at the pendulum and grabbing hold of it, and he began to climb to the top of the clock.

"Y'know, Perry the Platypus, I just can't remember what today is," Doofenshmirtz mused in mild frustration from beside the Time Transporter-Inator. "It's crazy, because I could have sworn I knew earlier today and I was all excited about it, and then- _poof! _Now it's gone. And I can't find my calendar, either! Why do I have such bad luck?" He turned around to face Perry, probably so he could complain some more- only to see an empty grandfather clock. He blinked, then came closer to the clock to examine it. "Perry the Platypus? Where'd you go?"

Just then, Perry opened the roof of the clock like a hatch and peered down at his nemesis. He chattered loudly as if to say, _Up here._ Doofenshmirtz looked up just in time to yell as Perry crashed into him, knocking him to the ground forcefully. Without a backward glance, Perry leapt off and began to sprint towards the Time Transporter-Inator, intent on getting rid of it before it could do anything else. Plan or no plan, Doofenshmirtz could still wreak havoc with this thing just by being _present_ in another time period. Unfortunately Doofenshmirtz, being very resilient, managed to recover his wits in time to pry himself off the floor and chase after Perry.

"Gotcha!" he yelled, launching himself at the agent and effectively flattening him. Perry struggled for a moment under Doofenshmirtz's weight, then managed to fling the doctor off of him and leapt back up. Doofenshmirtz flew through the air and crash-landed on the Time Transporter-Inator's control pad, which, surprisingly, wasn't even dented.

He growled as he got back up and glared at Perry. "Oh, you're gonna get it now!"

Perry just cocked an eyebrow and beckoned as if to say, _Bring it on._

Then Doofenshmirtz let out a mad battle cry, and the two of them rushed forward to engage the other. Fists began to fly, Perry was leaping around wildly, and Doofenshmirtz's hair was soon even more of a disaster than it had been before. However, in the heat of their confrontation, both of the adversaries failed to notice a shadow behind the Time-Transporter-Inator; a shadow that discreetly moved toward the controls.

"Hold still, Perry the Pest-a-pus!" shouted Doofenshmirtz as he made a swipe at his quick-footed nemesis. Perry performed an agile flip out of the way and evaded it easily. Having missed the initial attack, Doofenshmirtz launched a punch at Perry, who dived right under the evil scientist's legs and wound up next to the Time Transporter-Inator.

Frustrated, Doofenshmirtz growled and whipped around to face Perry, accidentally throwing an arm out in the process that hit the little platypus with a loud _thump _in the chest. Perry was knocked backward, out of breath, and landed inside the Time Transporter-Inator, whose doors were still open. Doofenshmirtz, suddenly getting a mad idea, turned to the control pad to close the doors- but before he could even touch it, something strange happened.

The doors slammed shut with a click, there came a loud whirring noise from the machine, and lights began to blink alarmingly. Doofenshmirtz stared in bewilderment as the Time-Transporter-Inator activated once more, this time of its own accord, with lights flashing from the interior and a powerful hum that got louder by the moment.

Inside the Inator, Perry was just as stunned as Doofenshmirtz. He glanced wildly around the walls, looking for some way of breaking out, but there was nothing- no visible means of opening the doors- and then, before he could do anything else, the device suddenly gave off a huge flash of light that seemed to erase the rest of the world.

The floodlight floor lit up, enveloping everything in blindingly bright, harsh light. Other smaller lights around the exterior suddenly began to blink frantically, though the room was by now so flooded that no one could see. Perry slammed his fists against the walls of the machine desperately, his heart racing faster than it ever had in his life, all sound blotted out by the booming noise inside the Inator. Doofenshmirtz covered his eyes and ran away shrieking, but the noise of the Inator was so loud that you could hardly hear him.

For an excruciating moment, the blinding light persisted, but then, in the blink of an eye, it was all over. The light vanished; the Time-Transport-Inator fell silent; the room showed no trace of anything having happened there.

Doofenshmirtz looked up slowly, his arms still tucked over his head for protection. For another moment, there was absolute silence. Then he cautiously approached the control panel and pressed a button to open the door. He watched intently as the door slid open, his mind feeling rather numb. Had it really happened? Could everything really have happened that…easily?

As the door slid to a halt, he peered inside cautiously, ready to run in case Perry leapt out to launch an attack; but no attack came. And it seemed it wouldn't be coming anytime soon, because Perry…

Well, Perry was gone.

Doofenshmirtz quickly scanned the inside of the machine, the walls, the ceiling, and even the rest of the lab, just in case Perry really had escaped. He even got out the Platy-Tracker 3000 that he had bought from a TV commercial once, but it received no signal whatsoever. Did that mean Perry was really gone? And…Doofenshmirtz had won? It seemed too good to be true…

He was about to give up and conclude that he really had won when something caught his eye; light glinting off of a small, plastic package on the floor. He quickly picked up the thing and inspected it, only to find that it was one of the many things he despised; a cuppy-cake. He was about to throw it away in disgust when he noticed another thing about it; the plastic wrapper had some kind of handwritten note inscribed on it. He didn't recognize the handwriting immediately; it was in a beautifully written script that might have taken a lifetime for one to master, yet it seemed to have been scribbled down quickly. Doofenshmirtz gasped as he realized what it meant- and what he had missed.

"Oh, yeah! _That's _why I was building something big!" he muttered in understanding. Then he frowned. "I guess it's too late to give him his card now…" For the note read;

_Happy neme-versary, Doof! -Perry_

He almost wished he hadn't seen the note; it made his victory seem sort of hollow and not quite right. Still, it had happened, and nothing would change that. The last thing to do, then, was to check just how far his nemesis had been transported into the future. Doofenshmirtz approached the machine's control pad and checked it- only to see that something was obviously wrong. The control pad featured a blinking set of numbers that seemed to be counting down- and with a start, he realized it was the self-destruct. It had activated of its own accord, just like the machine, and was steadily counting down with a mere five seconds to go. It must have been going the entire time he was looking for Perry.

Doofenshmirtz groaned. "Oh, man, I really do have bad luck," he muttered to himself.

_**BOOM!**_

_To be continued…_


	2. Wake Up Call

_Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated!_

…_Eight years later…_

Gray fog covered the city like a fuzzy blanket, dark and thick, coating the sky so you couldn't see the sun. Such a miserable morning reflected the hearts of the citizens, who were tired and gray themselves. The dark fog over the city only intensified their gloom as they traveled to work in their various means of transportation, none of them looking forward to their jobs. Such was a typical Danville morning, with the inclusion of cold weather. Obviously, things were bad. But they hadn't always been.

Eight years ago, the city had been a bright, thriving place. Justice always prevailed. Fun was foremost in most people's minds. No one had expected it to change anytime soon, but it had. And ever so quickly.

Now, the city was an isolated fortress; a place from which no soul could escape. Most people were completely miserable with it. In fact, on that cold, colorless morning, there was only one person who wasn't relatively miserable.

And his name was Doctor Heinz Doofenshmirtz.

He was sitting in his laboratory at Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated, the tallest building in town, keeping himself busy with various mechanical endeavors as the citizens trudged about below. The windows were shut against the cold, but no one would be breaking them today. The doors were locked to keep intruders out; but there were no intruders in the first place. Such precautions were merely habits of a past life. Even the ceiling would remain undamaged today, as it had for years.

Doofenshmirtz himself was seated beside a large, tube-shaped machine, connecting wires in one compartment near the control panel. His hair was even more of a mess than usual, and it had a gray hair or two mixed in with the brown. He didn't look as if he'd done anything but work on the machine for quite a while, but it was obviously worth it; the device seemed nearly complete. Finally, he stepped back to admire his work.

"At last, it is complete…" he murmured in a scratchy voice that hadn't been used in a while. Then he cleared his throat and called, "Norm! Get over here, I'm finished!"

"Coming, sir," came the robot's voice. There was a clanking sound from his mechanical feet, and a few moments later, Norm clunked over to his master's side, wearing a party hat. Doofenshmirtz frowned.

"What are you, going to a birthday party?" he asked sarcastically.

"Yay, it's finished!" Norm stated in his robotic voice. He shook a noisemaker brightly in celebration.

Doofenshmirtz groaned. "I need to update you," he muttered to himself. Then he cleared his throat again and straightened up. "Look, whatever. The point is, I, Doctor Heinz Doofenshmirtz, have finally rebuilt my old creation-" he indicated the machine as he spoke, "the Time-Transporter Inator!"

"Didn't you already build that?" Norm asked.

"Well, yeah, that's why I said I rebuilt it," Doofenshmirtz confirmed eagerly, stepping over to the control pad. "See, I never got to finish using it all those years ago. I wonder if it worked?" He pondered this for a moment, before shrugging. "Okay, I'm going to go get a snack or something. Then let's turn it on and see if it worked!" And he sauntered out of the room, headed for the kitchen.

No sooner had he left the room then the machine suddenly lit up on its own, beeping wildly with bright lights blinking all over it. Norm's painted face was illuminated in green and white light, dancing and fluttering over his never-changing grin.

"Sir, you may want to see this," he called in his nonchalant, mechanical tone.

"Not now, Norm," Doofenshmirtz called back irritably. "I can't find the pretzels."

"The machine appears to have activated, sir," Norm insisted.

There was a short silence, and then the sound of running feet as Doofenshmirtz dashed back into the room. "Why didn't you say something?" he berated the robot, stopping just behind Norm to stare as the machine released a puff of smoke, then began to wind down. The beeping stopped. The lights calmed. For a moment, everything was still.

After a few seconds of silence, Doofenshmirtz grinned. "Norm, go get the control switch," he instructed, brows furrowed evilly. Norm promptly headed to the control pad, while Doofenshmirtz positioned himself by the entrance. Then Norm pushed a button and the doors opened with a hiss of steam. Doofenshmirtz peered inside eagerly, but was confused by what he saw.

The quarter he had tested the machine with all those years ago was fine; but the lab rat he had used was collapsed on the floor, unmoving. Unnerved, the doctor backed away with a grimace.

"Ah, Norm, go take that over…somewhere," he said, with a dismissive little flick of the hand. It was a good thing he hadn't used the Inator on himself, he supposed…who knew what would have happened.

"Yes, sir," said Norm in his usual pleasant tone, oblivious to his master's put-off attitude. He promptly scooped up the lab rat and the quarter and carried them away, dropping the money in a coin jar as he left. Doofenshmirtz sighed and closed the door to the machine again. Failure really didn't feel good; especially when you'd waited eight years for it. He began to walk away, hunched over in dejection, when something made him stop in his tracks.

_Beep._

_Whirr._

_Beep, beep, beep, beep…_

Doofenshmirtz stared. Before he knew it, the machine had lit up again of its own accord and was beeping madly. Obviously, it had more to spit out than just a coin and a rat.

"Norm, hurry back over here! It's doing it again!" Doofenshmirtz called excitedly, eager to see if this one had worked. Norm set the lab rat on a table and marched back over to his human master, who was practically hopping up and down in anticipation.

"Was something else transported?" Norm asked as he reached the machine.

"Well, of course! Otherwise it wouldn't be turning on!" Doofenshmirtz retorted in an exasperated tone. Sometimes Norm was just so clueless.

"Do you know what it was?" the robot continued. Doofenshmirtz was about to snap back that he knew _exactly_ what it was when something hit him; he actually didn't.

He ceased his hopping for a moment, as the machine began to jitter wildly, and put a hand on his chin in thought. If he remembered correctly, it was something important; something very important. Something that had felt good to lose at the time, but eventually became his biggest regret.

The Inator abruptly let out a huge flash of light that enveloped the room, and Doofenshmirtz shielded his eyes as if shielding himself from attack.

_Attack._

And it hit him as if someone had just shouted, "Duh!" in his face.

The light cleared and the whirring and beeping from the Time-Transporter Inator died to a subtle undertone, which finally disappeared altogether. Doofenshmirtz was too shocked by remembrance to move, and so he merely stood still and waited for something. Norm, being rather socially tactless, was the first to break the silence.

"Would you like me to get the door, sir?" he asked.

Doofenshmirtz was silent for a moment before replying. "…Uh, yeah. Go ahead."

Norm marched over to the control pad and pressed a button, oblivious to the doctor's sudden anxiety as usual. Doofenshmirtz approached the machine cautiously, a cross between fear and curiosity displayed on his features. The door slid open smoothly at Norm's touch, and all Doofenshmirtz could do was stare at the sight before him.

Somehow, he managed to gulp and say, "Oh, there you are, Perry the Platypus."

For there on the floor of the chamber, halfway curled up in what seemed an almost cruel manner, was Perry himself.

"Is there a problem, sir?" Norm asked from beside the Inator. Doofenshmirtz nodded.

Little did he know, his problems were just beginning.

* * *

><p>"Set him down here, Norm."<p>

"Right away, sir."

Norm laid the platypus down quickly, pulled the sheets over him, and then backed out of the guest room as Doofenshmirtz stood over the bed and observed his nemesis. After recovering from the initial shock, he had managed to calm himself enough to not do anything foolish (like stick his nemesis in a trap and stare at it expectantly until he awoke). So far, he hadn't done much except have Norm move Perry to the guest room, where he could stay as long as necessary. He wasn't too keen on the robot tucking Perry into bed, but he supposed they had to do _something _with him (although frankly the trap idea was seeming more and more tempting).

Of course, to prevent the secret agent's inevitable attempts at escape, Doofenshmirtz would have to install some sort of security system around the room…probably some lasers, maybe a ray gun or two, and of course, a reliable trap. Just as long as it prevented Perry from getting out unexpectedly, he was happy.

But he wondered if he would need it. He hadn't even thought to check if Perry was breathing; if he was, it was an imperceptible form of breathing that only Perry could pull off. Common sense told him that he could just check the platypus' pulse- but on the other hand, hard-earned instinct told him that attempting to do this would earn him a punch in the gut.

But punch in the gut or no, he guessed he'd have to check on his little nemesis eventually. If the Time Transporter-Inator turned out to be more dangerous than he had expected…well, he wasn't sure what that would mean. But the thought of something happening to Perry wasn't exactly a good one; Doofenshmirtz had always wanted to be the one to bring him down. It wasn't supposed to happen by accident.

He sighed. Trying to take his mind off things, he let his gaze wander to Perry's face. Suddenly the platypus seemed so much smaller than he remembered, so perfectly peaceful, his features relaxed to an almost blank extent. It was strange, but there was something so _innocent_ about him that almost made the evil scientist sad. Why this was so even bewildered Doofenshmirtz himself, but the only plausible answer was this; if he had tried to hurt Perry, then it would have felt good to be victorious. But an accident such as this…somehow it only felt cruel. Unnecessary.

He cleared his throat. No reaction from Perry, of course. "Well, this is an awkward way to meet," he muttered resentfully to the empty room. "It's been years, you know. You're _beyond _late."

A tense moment of silence followed.

Then, on a completely unrelated topic, his expression softened just a tiny bit and he said, "You know the Time-Transporter Inator? I, ah…I wasn't actually going to use it on you."

Another uncomfortable moment.

Then he scowled angrily, as if Perry had just given him one of his sarcastic glares. "Look, I didn't want it to end up like this either! You're the one who just _had_ to go and fall in…nice one, Perry the Platypus. Very smooth."

Then he paused, suddenly aware that Perry was asleep. A frustrated sigh escaped him, and he muttered exasperatedly, "I'm talking to an unconscious platypus."

Just then, Norm poked his head in through the doorway. "Sir, I have news," he said, still in his ordinary, cheery tone. Somehow, it irritated Doofenshmirtz even more than usual.

"Hurry up, Norm. I'm busy," he responded, annoyed. Busy with what, exactly, he wasn't sure- talking to an unconscious platypus was probably not a good use of his time.

Norm entered the room, carrying something that confused Doofenshmirtz- the lab rat from his earlier experiment. But what confused him further was what it was doing.

The creature was clearly awake, hiding in Norm's hand and trembling in fear. Norm took the opportunity to explain. "Your lab rat was only unconscious, sir."

Doofenshmirtz stared for a moment, a million thoughts running through his head. Of course…the bright strobe lights and earsplitting noises must have been too much for the small creature, causing it to faint. And if the lab rat was only unconscious…

Finally, he responded, "Well…now we know the machine works."

Then there was a small chirping noise from the direction of the bed. Doofenshmirtz turned to face Perry, who seemed to have drifted into a lighter consciousness. Norm's loud voice seemed to have partially jolted him out of his slumber, and he curled himself into a ball for comfort. His breathing became deeper and more noticeable; you would think he hadn't breathed for days. Technically, Doofenshmirtz supposed, he hadn't.

The doctor sighed, a small smile breaking over his face. Feeling relieved, he reached out awkwardly and gave Perry's shoulder a gentle pat. Perry frowned in his sleep, as if he was aware of the touch and didn't like it. After a quiet moment in which they were all still, Doofenshmirtz cleared his throat and withdrew his hand.

"Come on, Norm. Let's go," he announced with a sort of defiance. Norm's face didn't change, as it hadn't been built for facial expressions, but you could tell he was confused.

"What about your friend?" he asked.

"He's not my friend, that's absurd," Doofenshmirtz insisted hotly. "And he'll be fine. See, Norm, that's the problem with Perry the Platypus…"

As he shooed Norm out of the room and closed the door behind himself, he took one last look at the peacefully sleeping Perry. "He always gets back up."

* * *

><p>The cold, gray morning gradually turned into an equally cold and gray afternoon, and with little ceremony, the sun finally broke through the clouds. Its warmth wasn't much comfort for the citizens as they went about their business, but the subtle rays that peeked through the windows of Doofenshmirtz Evil Inc. were enough to coax Perry out of his long sleep.<p>

The platypus had spent the majority of the day unconscious, unaware of the various happenings around him. Now and then, Doofenshmirtz would peek in through the door to see whether he had woken up yet, but each time he was disappointed. Either Perry's internal clock had been set back a few hours too far, or time travel was an extremely draining experience.

Eventually, the clock struck four, and Doofenshmirtz was getting tired of waiting. He'd had enough time to install a top-notch security system so Perry couldn't get out of the room, with lasers and cages and stunning beams and the like. He'd even had enough time to play a game of hide and seek with Norm, who hadn't improved in eight years and was still convinced that a telephone pole was an acceptable thing to hide behind. He was bored from sitting outside the guest room door all day, and he couldn't quite bring himself to leave, should Perry awake in his absence. But at some point, he realized how hungry he had become while he waited, and he had to go for refreshments. "Norm, don't forget to check on Perry the Platypus now and then, okay?" he told the robot as he headed out of the room.

"Okay," Norm complied.

"And if he wakes up, call me. Got that?" he continued as he rounded the corner.

"Got it," Norm confirmed. Doofenshmirtz exited the room, then poked his head back in.

"And no false alarms, Norm," he instructed sternly, shaking a finger to further illustrate his point.

"Yes, sir," Norm replied obediently. Satisfied, Doofenshmirtz left for the kitchen.

Norm sat on the floor with a loud _clang _and stared at the guest room door complacently.

He wouldn't be going anywhere anytime soon.

* * *

><p>Inside the guest room, Perry was still sleeping soundly. Out the window, birds were singing as they swooped through the city, and a few of them landed on the windowsill. They began to chirp loudly, so loudly that it carried through the window into the room. In the bed, Perry began to stir. The noise reached his ears and alerted him that it was morning (although he would soon realize that it was long past), and he smiled drowsily. Feeling the warm blankets on his back, he thought he was home with the boys.<p>

_Good morning, Phineas, _he thought to himself. _Or are you Ferb? I can't seem to remember which one of you I fell asleep next to…_

He rolled over with a mind to receive a hug from whichever boy he was sleeping next to, only to find that no one was there; the blankets were empty except for him. A light frown crossed his face. Maybe he had slept late.

Then he noticed a jarring detail that he had missed- he could feel the familiar weight of his trademark fedora, still resting on his head. Feeling unsettled, he opened his eyes just a bit to see the room clearly. What he saw gave him a start and made him blink several times, just to make sure he was seeing things clearly.

Rather than being in Phineas' and Ferb's room, as he had expected, he appeared to be in someone's guest room, completely alone and tucked in bed nicely. The first thing he noticed about the room was that the walls were a bright purple, and so were the sheets on the bed. Sunshine filtered in through the window, even through the blinds, and part of it fell on the nightstand, where a black alarm clock with blinking green numbers sat.

Feeling alarmed (no pun intended), Perry glanced over at the clock and winced; he was _beyond _sleeping late. It was late afternoon already.

He stretched quickly and glanced around the room with eyes squinted suspiciously. How had he gotten here? What was this place? He couldn't seem to remember- perhaps a lingering effect of the long nap he'd just taken- and it was beginning to unsettle him.

There didn't seem to be anyone around. If he wanted to find out where he was, he would simply have to go investigate for himself. Pushing the sheets off, he swung his legs over the side of the bed and dropped down- but almost as soon as his feet touched the floor, they began to shake dangerously, and Perry realized just how weak his legs were. He felt as if he'd been doing something very strenuous and then abruptly collapsed, and judging by the fact that his legs had fallen asleep, he must have stayed that way for quite some time. For a moment, he searched his mind for a reason to explain why that would be so- and then the memories flooded back.

_Mission._

_Doofenshmirtz._

_Time machine._

It hit him so hard, he almost fell over, and he had to steady himself by holding on to the bed sheets. But even those proved too flimsy to sustain his weight, small though it might be, and he fell with a light _thump _to the floor. The sheets were partially tugged off of the bed, where they hung suspended. Perry didn't bother to fix them as he laid there on his back, his tail slightly squashed; his mind didn't have room for such thoughts as pain or making up a bed.

All of a sudden, a great deal of questions were popping up in his mind, each begging for attention and none of them seeming to get enough. Was he still in Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated? What had happened to Doofenshmirtz's scheme? Hadn't he fallen into the Time Transporter-Inator, and hadn't it done something weird? What had happened to him-?

And then, just as he was beginning to calm himself and think clearly, the doorknob rattled. Perry's fur stood on end for a moment, and he quickly rolled over and got to his feet with slight difficulty, hardly daring to breathe now. That could be anything- he had to be ready in case he needed to run or fight. The handle turned slowly, and the door swung open.

It must have been a strange sight; an entirely purple room containing a single, unmade bed, a window with the blinds closed even though it was the middle of the day, and a small teal platypus standing in the middle of it all in a shaky fighting stance. But even stranger, for Perry at least, was what he saw standing in the doorway of the room.

It was Norm the robot, tall and blankly smiling as ever, looking down at him with what one could hope was a pleased expression- with one whose face never changed, it was hard to tell.

"Good morning, sunshine!" Norm quipped happily.

And that was freaky enough for Perry.

Without even a 'hello', he dashed around Norm's feet and sprinted out the door, leaving the robot in his wake as he fled the room at top speed. So he _was _still at DEI? But he was in some kind of guest room? _What?_

Behind him, Norm had turned to pursue the escapee- but because Perry had set off the security system and was too fast to be caught by it, the laser grid Doofenshmirtz had installed activated and trapped Norm instead.

Norm merely commented, "Wait, come back! We can have coffee!"

Even if Perry had heard him, he wouldn't have cared- the only thought in his head at the moment was to get away and figure out what was going on. He didn't like the idea of being in enemy territory, but not knowing why, and if this really was Doofenshmirtz's house, then there might still be a scheme he needed to foil. The Tri-State Area could still be in danger!

However, even as his brain was working desperately through these problems, they blocked out all his thoughts, including something that mothers everywhere commonly told their children; no running in the house. Perry had frequently disobeyed this rule, and he usually didn't pay much heed to it, but it was especially good to keep in mind when rounding corners.

Which is why, when he sped around the very next one he came to, he promptly crashed into something rather painfully- or perhaps some_one._

All he heard was a loud, "OW!" as he collided with the person's knees, and he was knocked back with a _THUD. _Quickly regaining his wits, Perry scrambled to his feet and prepared to attack whatever he had crashed into- before he saw what it was and froze.

First the purple room, then Norm…

And now Doofenshmirtz?

Well, that settled it. Perry was not having a good day.

"Geez, watch it, Norm!" Doofenshmirtz complained, his eyes squinted shut and one hand massaging his kneecap. Apparently, he hadn't noticed who had crashed into yet, and Perry was too stunned for the moment to try to speak up.

However, it wasn't long before Doofenshmirtz looked up and noticed him. The scientist's face went from irritated to confused to shocked, all in the blink of an eye. For a moment, Perry was sure he was going to drawl, "Ah, Perry the Platypus, how unexpected…" and pull out some sort of remote and trap him. But no such attack came.

Instead, Doofenshmirtz stared with an indecipherable expression that rather unnerved Perry- something between shock and…relief.

Then he did something _completely_ unexpected; he broke into a genuinely happy grin. "Perry the Platypus, you're back!" he exclaimed.

Perry blinked, confused. _Back? _he wondered in bewilderment. What was that supposed to mean? And more importantly, wherever had he gone?

Doofenshmirtz seemed thrilled as he lifted himself to his feet, still smiling happily. "Hey, Norm, why didn't you tell me he woke up?" he called back to the robot.

"You laser trap works very well, sir," came Norm's voice from down the hall.

Doofenshmirtz blinked, then sighed. "Great," he muttered to himself. Then he straightened up. "Okay, I've got to go get Norm out of there," he told Perry. "And then you and I have to have a little talk."

_To be continued…_


	3. The Bitter Truth

**Author's Notes: **Fixed up a lot of dialogue from Perry and Doof in this chapter. Perry's attitude kinda freaked me out when I read over it recently! xD Oh well, hopefully that's a little better now.

Enjoy~

* * *

><p>Perry sat in the seat he had been offered, feeling very freaked out. Never before had he sat to 'talk' to Dr. Doofenshmirtz without suspecting an ulterior motive, and it was no different this time; but he was having trouble putting his full faith in that. Doofenshmirtz seemed absolutely thrilled that he was there, although he was still trying to conceal it (and doing a bad job). After the initial bewilderment at finding him escaping down the hall, the evil scientist was indeed very happy to find Perry awake; though he wasn't so thrilled about Norm getting caught in the laser grid he'd set up to catch the agent in. After fishing Norm out of the trap, he quickly escorted Perry to the living room and positioned him on one side of the coffee table. He then sat at the other end and tried to explain things to the platypus as best he could. So far, it was more of Perry asking questions than Doofenshmirtz actually answering them, and it wasn't getting very far.<p>

The first thing Perry wanted to know was what had happened to the doctor's scheme (in case he still needed to thwart it), which he communicated by writing a note. He handed the small piece of paper to his nemesis, who took it with a frown and read the note quickly, still amazed by how neat Perry's handwriting was. For a moment, he tried to think of a suitable answer.

"Yeah, about that…" he said uncertainly, "see, the Time Transporter-Inator kind of, ah…blew up without you. I still don't know what the deal with that was."

Perry raised an eyebrow. That couldn't be it, because he saw a machine identical to the one he'd tried to destroy through a door that lead to the lab. And he'd only arrived a little while ago, hadn't he? Doofenshmirtz was a fast builder, but not _that _fast.

Wanting a definite answer, Perry moved on to his next question, still written in note form. The note read, _What's that machine back there?_

Doofenshmirtz perked up a bit as he read it. "Oh, that!" he said happily. "It's the Time Transporter-Inator."

Perry blinked, a bit taken aback. His confusion must have shown, because Doofenshmirtz quickly answered.

"Oh, I rebuilt it," he said simply.

Perry's eyebrows came together in a suspicious glare. Okay, now Doofenshmirtz was just pulling his leg. Nobody could build that fast, except maybe Phineas and Ferb…and even they usually had a short montage first. This needed further investigation.

He picked up the pen and paper once more and was about to scribble down another question when Doofenshmirtz threw out his hands. "Whoa, whoa, wait," he told Perry. "I'm getting sick of taking notes. Can't we do this a different way?"

Perry raised an eyebrow and wrote one more note. _Do you HAVE_ _another way?_

Doofenshmirtz suddenly grinned. "Actually, yes!" he answered. "Yes, I do."

And without further ado, he leapt out of his seat and dashed out of the room, yelling over his shoulder as he went. "You wait there while I go get it!"

A little exasperated with his nemesis' juvenile antics, Perry readjusted himself in his seat and wondered briefly what this 'other way' was. Perhaps it was some sort of mind-reading device that would make whatever he was thinking appear on a screen. It seemed like something Doofenshmirtz would build, possibly to learn all of the Agency's secrets- or Perry's home address. Both were bad scenarios.

Just then, Doofenshmirtz came back into the room, carrying a small device that looked somewhat like the kind of headphones that you clip to your ear- except there was only one unit, and it had no wires attached. It was metallic silver and sported only two buttons, one green and one purple, and Doofenshmirtz looked very proud of it.

Doofenshmirtz strode over to the coffee table and set the device down on Perry's end, then sat back and waited eagerly. Perry stared down at the thing. He glanced back up at Doofenshmirtz, who gestured at it with a grin. Wondering just what it was, and more importantly, whether it might explode, Perry picked it up gingerly and gave it a quick examination. However, finding nothing to explain its function, he looked back up at Doofenshmirtz and tilted his head inquisitively.

Doofenshmirtz seemed to deflate a little. "Ohh, you're wondering what it is." He cleared his throat. "Well, let me introduce you to yet another of my _brilliant_ inventions- the Disguise-Inator!"

One of Perry's eyebrows went up. He crossed his arms. _And just what do you expect that to do?_

Doofenshmirtz paused. "Oh. Right, that doesn't help…" He gave a little half shrug as if to say, _Whoops._ "See, the thing is, it's a combination Disguise-Inator aaand…wait for it…"

They both waited for it.

"Translator-Inator!" Doofenshmirtz announced loudly, the grin returning in full force. Perry blinked, then stared down at the device with a new perspective. If it worked as the name implied, then…

"Yeah, it works as the name implies," Doofenshmirtz confirmed, as if he'd read Perry's thoughts. "You clip it onto your ear, and it translates whatever you say into English! Isn't it cool- oh." He frowned suddenly, having realized a crucial error in this plan. "You don't, ah…you don't _have_ ears."

For a moment, he seemed to be at a loss of what to do. Perry, keeping his cool as always, simply clipped the device to the brim of his hat. Doofenshmirtz's jaw dropped in surprise.

"Oh, yeah!" he exclaimed in amazement. "Why didn't I think of that?"

Perry rolled his eyes and chattered, but as soon as he had finished, something happened that he hadn't expected. A high-pitched, girlish voice suddenly emanated from the Translator-Inator, which answered Doofenshmirtz's question.

"Because you're an idiot."

Both of them jumped slightly at the sound of the voice, and Perry instinctively grabbed the device off of his hat and dropped it like a hot coal.

Doofenshmirtz was the first to recover, raising his eyebrows with an appreciative smile. "Cool, it works!" Then he realized what Perry had said, and pouted angrily. "Hey, wait a minute!" And then he took note of the feminine voice the device had used, and grinned at the ludicrousness of this occurrence. "Ha! You sounded like a girl!"

Then he paused with a confused frown. "Okay, I've got some seriously mixed feelings about this one."

Perry merely stared wide-eyed at the device, which was now laying on the floor innocently. Sure, he had known that Doofenshmirtz's inventions usually functioned correctly- but correct or not, he hadn't expected a voice like that. He quickly picked it up and examined it, looking for a way to change the settings. Surely the girl's voice wasn't the only one in the machine.

Doofenshmirtz snickered quietly. "No, don't change it! You sound funny as a girl."

Perry glared at him and chattered once more. "That's totally why I want to change it!"

In response, Doofenshmirtz fell back in his chair, laughing uproariously. Perry, eyes narrow and teeth bared, turned back to the machine. "How do you change the settings on this thing?"

Just then, another voice came out of the device. _Settings have been activated. Please select a voice style._

Oh, so it was controlled by voice commands. "Like, finally!" He quickly cleared his throat and said, "Um…voice number one."

But instead of it coming out in a girl's voice, it came out in a deep male voice. Perry cringed; it was much too scratchy and gruff. "Voice number two." Now it was a southern accent. "Voice number three." That was the girl's voice. "Voice number four?" This was a cool woman's voice, like you would hear over an intercom. "Okay, number five." This one sounded like Carl, Major Monogram's nasally-voiced intern. Perry growled, irritated.

"How many voices do you have on here?" he asked, still using the squeaky voice. Doofenshmirtz, who had begun to calm down, tried to reply- but instead, he merely burst into laughter again. "I'm sorry, but I had him recorded and it was just too tempting!" he sputtered in between laughs. Perry instantly closed his mouth and glared.

This went on for a few minutes or so, each voice sounding less fitting than the last. It seemed Doofenshmirtz had installed every kind of voice and accent on the face of the planet on the device- a British accent, an old lady's voice, a Japanese one (which didn't just have a Japanese accent, but actually spoke the language), and even the doctor's own accent. Doofenshmirtz was now laughing so hard, he could hardly breathe, and it only made it worse when Perry spoke in the Druselsteinien accent, "Okay, voice number twenty-three had better work- AAAGH!"

And he promptly fell out of his seat, which of course only made Perry angrier.

Finally, Perry had tried nearly every voice on the machine, and he was frankly exhausted. Doofenshmirtz had by now run out of breath to laugh with, and he was merely laying limply on the floor, taking in deep breaths and giggling now and then.

Perry sighed (in an incredibly deep bass voice) and commanded, "Voice number thirty."

To his surprise, this one wasn't laughable in the least. It sounded bold, clear, and steadfast, but calm at the same time, like the kind of voice that would come out of a hero. It suited Perry perfectly.

Doofenshmirtz lifted his head and blinked. "Wow," he murmured, as if impressed with how well the voice fit Perry. Then he shook himself. "Aw, how come you get to sound so cool? That's just not fair!"

Perry grinned. "In that case, I'm keeping it," he confirmed, enjoying the annoyed frown that his remark had sparked in Doofenshmirtz.

Doofenshmirtz snorted in irritation. So much for all his fun, he supposed. "Well, now that that's finished, can we get back to the questioning?" he asked, picking himself up off the scratchy green carpet.

Perry paused, trying to remember what his question had been in the first place. "Oh, right. I was just going to ask about the Time Transporter-Inator. I thought I fell into it, but if it blew up, how did I survive? What happened exactly?"

Doofenshmirtz sighed. As relieved as the doctor was to have his nemesis back, Perry was not going to like this answer one bit. He braced himself as he began to break the news.

"Okay," he began uncomfortably. "Here's how it is. When you fell into the machine, it activated…and transported you into the future. Then it blew up, and it wasn't until now that I thought to rebuild it."

Perry raised his eyebrows. "You're kidding."

Doofenshmirtz gulped and continued, rather discouraged. "Uh, nope. Not kidding. I guess you'll want to know just how far in the future you are, huh," he commented, to which Perry responded with a brisk nod. "Fine. But you won't like this."

Perry's expression faltered just the smallest bit. Okay, yes, being transported into the future was surely not a good thing- but it couldn't really be _that_ bad, could it? Doofenshmirtz had only transported the other things about eight minutes into the future, and he hadn't changed the settings as far as Perry could see. So, he might have been out for an hour or two, and maybe missed dinner or something. That wasn't a big deal.

However, this was apparently not the case, for Doofenshmirtz bit his lip and said, "You've been gone…for eight years."

It was just as the doctor had predicted.

Perry didn't like it.

His eyes widened in horror and he stared at Doofenshmirtz with a shell-shocked gape, not daring to believe that he had been missing for so long. His thoughts came to a standstill, his mind froze over, and for a moment absolutely no noise, not even breath, escaped him. For a few moments, he remained like that, while Doofenshmirtz began to regret bringing it up at all. The silence was so tense, it was almost tangible.

Finally, Doofenshmirtz gathered his nerves and frowned in irritation. "Well, you don't have to be like that," he said stubbornly.

Perry hardly heard him. Eight years…that couldn't be right, it was simply ludicrous!

He gave a little shiver. "But how could you do that? The- the test thing- you said it would be back in eight _minutes!_ What happened with that, huh?"

Doofenshmirtz shrugged. "I don't know, I guess I set it wrong. Stuff happens!"

Perry gave an exasperated, "Ugh!" Then he demanded, "How could you possibly mess this up so badly?"

Doofenshmirtz seemed as uncomfortable as Perry was, perhaps more, but he continued anyway. "Come on, it's not _that _bad…" he insisted. "I mean, at least it's not like you have some huge family to get back to or anything."

Perry's eyes widened further as Doofenshmirtz's comment sparked a terrible horror in him; the boys. If Doofenshmirtz was telling the truth, he had missed their entire childhood. It was all gone, thrown to the winds of a former time. He briefly recalled Phineas' shining face whenever he thought of something to do for their daily activity, Ferb's blank serenity that never showed what he was thinking, and even Candace's wild frenzies to show Mom what the boys were doing. Even worse, he remembered the times when they would hold him close late at night, stroke his fur softly, and tell him everything was okay; even if he had his own worries that they didn't know about. The thought of losing it all…he wasn't sure he could live with that.

Perry instantly resolved that Doofenshmirtz must be lying, must be holding the truth from him to scare him into submission or something of the sort. But now that he looked at the man, he noticed small differences in his attire and features. The bags underneath Doofenshmirtz's eyes looked a little deeper than normal, maybe a little bigger, and his hair had a gray streak or two, perhaps brought on by stress. Overall, he didn't look that much older, but to a keen eye like Perry's, the differences were clear.

His attire was no different than it had been when last Perry saw him- he was still wearing his usual gray slacks, too-large shoes, and black turtleneck. The only change Perry could find was a cupcake-shaped button with a heart on it that read, '_L.O.V.E. M.U.F.F.I.N._', pinned to the front of Doofenshmirtz's ever-present lab coat.

Doofenshmirtz noticed him looking at it and glanced down at himself. "What, this?" he said, pointing at the button. "Oh, it's my LOVE MUFFIN pin. Rodney suggested the design for it as a joke at one of our meetings…pity we took him seriously."

He laughed as if recalling the memory, then frowned distastefully. "Except now he's taking it seriously, too. He insists we all wear them around."

Perry raised an eyebrow. He had never seen the pin before, and as much as he didn't want to believe it, it would make sense if it had come about after he was transported. But while he was lost in his own suspicions, there was a sudden knock at the door.

Doofenshmirtz looked up. "Hold on, I'll be right back." He strode over to the door, which had a computer screen where the peephole would have been. He pressed a button on the screen, and an image of whoever was standing outside the door appeared on it. Apparently seeing something that pleased him, he smiled and opened the door.

There stood a scrawny man in a white work shirt and jeans, holding several bags with the logo, _Sean's Seafood. _The man bowed respectfully to Doofenshmirtz, and Perry raised an eyebrow. While the delivery guy wasn't looking, Doofenshmirtz turned around and smirked.

"Good afternoon, Dr. Doofenshmirtz, sir," said the man, straightening up and holding out the bags to the doctor. "I have a delivery for the feast tomorrow."

"Ah, yes. Thanks, Joe," Doofenshmirtz replied in a satisfied voice. The man gave him a funny look, as if he was about to object, but then he seemed to think better of it. He handed the bags to Doofenshmirtz and bowed once more, then headed back down the hall at a brisk pace. Doofenshmirtz turned away from the door, which closed automatically, and dumped the bags on a nearby table. He then brushed his hands off and sat back down at the coffee table, looking very smug. Perry narrowed one eye questioningly.

"What was that all about?" he asked.

"Oh, the Joe thing?" Doofenshmirtz asked, with a little smile. "Well, I can't remember everybody's names, so I just call them Joe. I'm trying to get a law passed about it, but so far the rest of LOVE MUFFIN thinks it's stupid."

"That's because it _is_ stupid," Perry said scornfully. "But that's not actually what I meant."

Doofenshmirtz smirked. "Oh, the sudden respect. That was just another one of my loyal subjects, with a delivery of seafood for the upcoming LOVE MUFFIN feast. It's a celebration for the seventh anniversary of our conquest of the Tri-State Area!"

Perry jerked himself out of his thoughts and stared at the doctor in horror. _What?!_

Doofenshmirtz seemed genuinely excited about this, as if he had forgotten that it was Perry's job to prevent such an occurrence. "Yeah, not as great as taking over single-handedly. But hey, sometimes you need to get some help with these things, you know? No, you don't know. You do everything alone."

As he rambled on, Perry's expression slowly changed from shock to anger, and he gave a low growl. Doofenshmirtz suddenly seemed to remember who he was talking to.

"Ohh," he muttered to himself. "Yeah, that wasn't the brightest thing to say…"

But Perry wasn't about to listen to anything else. He didn't know whether Doofenshmirtz was actually telling the truth or not, but that didn't stop him from launching himself toward the evil scientist and knocking him out of his seat powerfully. The two of them tumbled to the floor, landing with Perry on top and Doofenshmirtz struggling to get out from underneath him. Perry put one hand at Doofenshmirtz's neck in a knifelike pose, and the evil scientist quickly stopped trying to escape. For a moment, they were both too winded to do anything but breathe heavily, but Perry recovered first.

"How did this happen?" he demanded in a low voice. "Tell me everything. And I mean _everything._ Leave anything out and you'll be sorry."

Doofenshmirtz gulped. "I liked you better without the translator."

Then Perry narrowed his eyes, and he hurried to explain. "Okay, okay, fine! So, you disappeared, and I looked for you for a long time- well, maybe not that long. I don't actually know how long I was-"

"Tell me all of the _important _parts," Perry hissed, irritated.

"Oh, right. Well, I searched for a while and couldn't find you, and then I noticed the self-destruct was activated on the Time Transporter-Inator, and it blew up. And after that, I just kind of enjoyed being allowed to do whatever I wanted, and I made a bunch of Inators, and after a while, I started on a serious plan to take over the Tri-State Area. So first, I had to go get some stuff from the store-"

Perry rolled his eyes. "Okay, less detail."

Doofenshmirtz huffed. "You are _so _picky!" Then Perry pressed his hand to the doctor's neck dangerously, and he quickly conceded. "I mean, less detail it is!"

Eventually, Perry had gotten the whole truth out of him, although he didn't like it any better now that he knew it all. It seemed that with the help of LOVE MUFFIN, Doofenshmirtz had indeed taken over the Tri-State Area. Even worse, he had then used his newfound power to find and defeat the O.W.C.A.

"It was the first thing that came to mind, actually," Doofenshmirtz commented as Perry stared at him with a horror-struck gape. "I mean, otherwise, they'd just send somebody else over to beat me up. But then Rodney…well, he got this idea that if we really wanted to rule the Tri-State Area, we had to do something about all the animal agents, too."

At this, Perry's eyes widened in alarm. Doofenshmirtz scowled. "For the record, my plan was better than his!" he insisted. "I was going to send them all to zoos, but nooo- Rodney said we had to go the _long _way to ensure our continuing domination of the city."

"And this 'long way', what is it exactly?" Perry pressed.

Doofenshmirtz frowned uncomfortably. "Um…he, uh…kind of eliminated them all."

Perry breathed in sharply, obviously very shaken. "You wouldn't."

"I _didn't!_" Doofenshmirtz insisted, looking away from his nemesis to avoid the scorching glare he was now receiving. "Look, it was all Rodney's idea, everybody else just went along with it, and, uh…I was against it from the start!"

Perry just stared at him piercingly.

Doofenshmirtz stared back.

They were both silent for a moment.

Then Doofenshmirtz cracked. "Okay, so I thought it was kind of clever. But the point is, I didn't come up with it, so please don't hurt me!"

Perry, whose free hand was now clenched into a fist, managed to relax a bit. He let out a carefully controlled, stressed sigh. "All of them…they're all…?"

"Um," said Doofenshmirtz uncomfortably. "There is one they could never find."

Perry stared at him, waiting for him to speak and say the answer that he already knew. "Please don't say what I think you're going to say."

Doofenshmirtz said it anyway, averting his eyes. "It looks like I found him."

For a moment, Perry let that sink in. He had been shot eight years into the future- a future where his worst enemy had achieved Tri-State Area domination. And worse, the Agency had finally fallen to LOVE MUFFIN, and almost all of its agents were extinct.

Perry was the last one.

He shook his head, eyes wide, unwilling to believe. "You're lying."

Doofenshmirtz scoffed instantly. "Seriously? You of all people- er, platypuses- should know that I'm no good at lying."

As if in a trance, Perry slowly removed his hand from the evil scientist's throat, allowing him room to breathe. He then stood swiftly and stepped off of him, refusing to look back as his feet carried him to a nearby window. The view showed a mist-filled, smoky-skied Danville, which was filled with citizens staring at their feet in a depressed manner. Perry pressed one hand against the glass and stared, trying to work out the situation in his mind. What now? He had to do _something. _He could attempt to defeat Doofenshmirtz and the rest of LOVE MUFFIN, possibly resulting in his own capture and demise…or, perhaps, seek out the Flynn-Fletchers and find out what happened to them and their friends…or he could find some way to go back and change whatever had caused this…but how? He was at a total loss of what to do.

Back at the coffee table, Doofenshmirtz had managed to lift himself up and was now massaging his neck. He glared at Perry's turned back as the platypus stared hollowly out the window and muttered something about never getting a kind word out of his nemesis. He had been very excited about having Perry back at first, believing that they could return to their usual routine. Now, it was obvious that things would never be the same. He had brought Perry to the future for nothing, and the only result was that his nemesis hated him even more now.

The doctor sighed. As humiliating as he was sure it would be, he saw only one course of action that could possibly ease his conscience- and that was to send Perry home.

He cleared his throat. "Uh, Perry the Platypus?"

Perry didn't turn to face him; instead, he only made a quiet chirping sound that didn't translate into anything. Doofenshmirtz took that as a sign to continue.

"Okay, before you get all depressed," he said hesitantly. "I just want to-"

Just then, he was interrupted by the sound of the phone ringing. Perry's fur stood on end briefly and his muscles tensed, before he realized what the noise was and relaxed. Doofenshmirtz groaned- he'd have to speak with Perry later.

"I've gotta take this," he muttered, and he left for the nearest phone, which was in the kitchen. As he went, Perry turned to watch with a slightly disappointed expression. He was certain that Doofenshmirtz had been about to tell him something important; likely unusual and certainly awkward for the evil scientist, but important all the same.

After Doofenshmirtz had left, Perry turned back to the window to weigh his options. For a moment, he simply played absentmindedly with a nearby toy- a bobble head version of himself that Doofenshmirtz had made for a craft- and rethought the situation.

So apparently the Tri-State Area belonged to Doofenshmirtz and LOVE MUFFIN, and if he went anywhere, he was likely to be captured or even destroyed. He desperately wanted to go home to the boys, but he knew they wouldn't be there. If he had been able, he would have called the Agency far beforehand and gotten some help. But of course this was impossible now.

Then something occurred to him- since when was it a wise idea to trust Doofenshmirtz on an issue of such importance as this? How could he take his nemesis' word for anything without being suspicious? The answer: he couldn't. And the only place he knew that _could _give him a straight answer was the one place that Doofenshmirtz claimed was gone.

_But that's just the kind of thing he'd say, _Perry thought to himself as he pulled back the fur on his left wrist, revealing what looked like an ordinary wristwatch. He pressed a button on the spy communicator, which activated a holographic screen. Then he punched in a special code, and the watch emitted a ringing noise.

"Carl better not make me leave a message again," he murmured to himself. Really, he was sort of waiting for Carl to pick up because he was hoping so desperately that everything Doofenshmirtz had told him was indeed a lie. That someone would pick up and tell him everything was okay, and that everything would go back to normal.

But in the back of his mind, he knew it wouldn't.

When the watch's ringing ended, there was a small beep, and a deep male voice that certainly wasn't Carl's or the Major's answered. "Hello, you've reached LOVE MUFFIN, where being bad is good. Please leave a message at the tone." And there was a loud _beep._

Perry chattered in bewilderment- how had he called LOVE MUFFIN? He had dialed the Agency's number specifically, not the number for the very group of villains he wanted to defeat. Then he realized the message was still running, and he shut the watch off quickly.

Feeling rather nervous now, he hid the watch underneath his fur once more and grimaced. "I hope I didn't just make a huge mistake."

* * *

><p>The sound of computer keys filled a dark room, the endless tapping and clicking forming a sort of rhythm in the screen-lit gloom. Computer screens and televisions set up on every available wall space surrounded the area, and sitting at each of those computers was a man. Each was intently focused on his screen, his eyes never leaving it except to blink. The surveillance room was indeed an eerie place to come to work.<p>

Suddenly, one of the guards reached up to touch an earpiece he was wearing, and pressed a button on it. A microphone extended from the tiny piece, and he spoke calmly into it. "Hello, you've reached LOVE MUFFIN, where being bad is good. Please leave a message at the tone." And there was silence for a moment while whoever was on the other end did just that. As the guard listened to it, clearly waiting to hear whether it was actually worth answering, his eyes widened ever so slightly in confusion. He quickly pressed another button on the computer he sat by, and began to type furiously. On the other end, there was a good deal of noise, but only one part of it interested the guard.

The computer screen flashed with several insistent messages, such as 'Call Recording in Progress' and 'Starting Command Central Link'. Just then, the call he had been listening to so intently ended abruptly, and he cursed its brevity. Another window popped up on the computer, showing a mirror reflection of the guard's face and bearing the text, 'Video in Progress'. He cleared his throat and spoke brusquely into the microphone. "Sirs, I'd like to present important information."

In another faraway room, a large assembly of people were seated around a U shaped table, each staring intently at their own computer screen. The video of the guard had appeared on each screen, and although he couldn't see them, they were watching his every move. He went on from his original statement to say, "I received a call just now, from an unstated source. I recorded the call and request to show it to you."

One of them, seated at the head of the table, spoke in a strangely accented voice and nodded his large, bald head. "Yes, go ahead."

The guard quickly tapped a key on his computer, and an audio clip began to play. The clip mostly consisted of the guard's greeting, but after the tone, another noise began to play. It didn't sound like human speech, as one would have expected. Rather, it sounded more like…an aggravated purr.

Once the clip had run over, the gathered people all began to whisper amongst themselves. The one who had spoken earlier had a thoughtful expression displayed on his features. He smiled. "And just what did you make of it, may I ask?"

The guard looked surprised that his opinion was being asked of him, but he quickly cleared his throat to respond. "Uh, it sounded kind of like a platypus, sir."

"Indeed," replied the man. He gazed around at the others with that pleased, yet malicious smile. "Boys, we've found our little lost agent."

_To be continued…_


	4. Something is Going to Explode

**Author's Notes:** Edit: After editing this one again, I'm still a little miffed with the way I depicted Perry. Oh well, I think he's a little better now...at least, I hope... ^^; /edit  
>It's a longshot that anybody will notice this, but I actually made a reference to one of my other stories in this chapter, 'How I Met My Nemesis'. The reference is the part where Doof is thinking about whether he should save Perry, but I can't say any more here because it would give that part away.<p>

BTW, the Lassie joke was my mom's idea, so credit goes to her for that one. In fact, a lot of credit goes to her for the whole story, because she thought up a lot of these ideas in here, like the seafood battle and the platypus net. Thanks, Mom! ^_^

Also, if you haven't seen 'Bobblehead Perry the Platypus', then go see 'Just Passing Through'. XD I didn't make that one up.

Anyhoo, hope you enjoy this chapter!

* * *

><p>Doofenshmirtz wandered into his kitchen with a sulky expression and a vague notion to berate whoever was calling him for the bother they'd caused. Of course, someone just <em>had <em>to call him right when he was trying to talk to his long-lost nemesis (who, admittedly, was not being a very good conversationalist at the time, but still).

Reaching the phone, he cleared his throat. "Okay, who's calling now?" These days, he rarely received phone calls- and when he did, it was usually LOVE MUFFIN on the line.

Sure enough, the phone proclaimed in a mechanical voice, "LOVE MUFFIN requests an audience, sir."

Doofenshmirtz rolled his eyes. "Aw, come on! They're _constantly_ pestering me, and I'm in the middle of something important. Ask if it can wait."

"Yes, sir," replied the mechanical voice. There was silence for a moment before it replied, "They request to speak immediately on urgent business, sir."

Doofenshmirtz sighed in irritation, then picked up the phone. "Okay, you guys. What is it this time?"

On the other end, a strange voice of indefinable descent replied, "That's no way to greet your colleagues, Heinz."

Doofenshmirtz scowled as he replied, "Oh, hello, _Rodney._"

"I prefer you use my full name!" Rodney replied heatedly. "Aloyse Everheart Eliza-"

Then someone else on the other end interrupted, saying, "Just let it go, man."

"Yeah, let it go, Rodney," sneered Doofenshmirtz. "So, what's up?"

Instead of Rodney replying, another voice spoke (it seemed they had put him on speaker phone). "We've detected an unwanted visitor in your building via the security cameras."

"What? Why would you be looking at _my _security cameras?" Doofenshmirtz blurted. "I mean, seriously. It's my own house, I think I can take care of it. I'll go get Norm…"

He turned away from the phone and was about to yell for the robot when Rodney spoke once more. "Wait. Has he been updated recently?"

"Well, no," Doofenshmirtz admitted. "I keep meaning to get around to it…"

"Then he won't be able to handle it," Rodney replied coldly.

Doofenshmirtz's scowl returned. "Why not? Norm's perfectly capable of-"

"We're not playing around, Heinz. We know he's in your building."

"Who, Norm?"

"Guess again."

Doofenshmirtz growled in an aggravated manner. "Seriously, what? I got nothing."

At first, there was only a condescending sigh. Then someone on the other end replied, "Oh, please, Doofenshmirtz. We know Perry the Platypus is in your house."

Doofenshmirtz paused. "Oh, him," he answered. "Well, you could have just said that. Of course he's in my house."

"Heinz, do you have any idea what this means?" Rodney continued patronizingly. "You know very well that we swore to eliminate all of the animal agents."

"Yeah, and?" said Doofenshmirtz defensively. "Come on, I literally just got him back today! Can't we make an exception this time?"

"Well, what _for?_" one of the evil scientists on the other end asked.

Doofenshmirtz frowned uncomfortably, then retorted, "Um…that's none of your business! I'm part of this group too, remember? I'm the one who formed it and secured our domination over the entire Tri-State Area! I should get my say in these things!"

"_All_ of the agents, Doofenshmirtz," said Rodney calmly. "Not just some of them; all of them. And if you don't want to comply, then you're a traitor."

"But-"

"We've sent some minions over to your building to pick him up. They should be arriving…oh, right about now, actually. Try and trap him while you still can, will you?"

"But!-"

"Oh, and once this is over, let's all get together and have lunch," Rodney added. "We can celebrate our elimination of the _entire _OWCA!" And there was a loud burst of collective maniacal laughter on the other end, before they hung up abruptly.

Doofenshmirtz stared blankly for a moment, listening to the dial tone as he thought that over. He set the phone back in its place.

Perry the Platypus was _not _going to like this.

* * *

><p>Even as Doofenshmirtz was on the phone, something was happening outside his building. Several sleek black cars pulled up at the front of the building and parallel parked neatly (except for one, which went back and forth for a few seconds before ultimately settling in a space), and out of each stepped a few men. All of them were wearing identical black suits and sunglasses, and pinned to the crisp black jacket of each man was a small pin- a cupcake with a heart on it that bore the initials, <em>L.O.V.E. M.U.F.F.I.N.<em>. The sheer sight of it sent passersby in wide circles around them.

One of the men stepped forward and led the others to the doors of the building, which clicked and slid apart for them. They stepped inside the lobby, their leather shoes clicking against the smoothly reflective floor, and the leader turned to face the rest of them.

"Okay, men," he announced in a deep, gruff voice. "We're going up against a highly trained secret agent who has been fighting evil for years and probably knows the layout of this building very well. We'll have to be extremely careful if we want to take him down, capiche?"

They all nodded very seriously. The leader nodded back. Then he asked, "So, does everyone have their various aquatic animal-related nets?"

There was a general smattering of agreement, and several of the men held up crab nets on sticks or thickly woven fish nets. The leader frowned.

"Some actual _weapons _would be nice," he criticized. "But on the other hand, this is a two-foot tall critter with a duckbill we're talking about. I think we're good."

He raised a fist in the air. "For LOVE MUFFIN!"

The others mimicked him. "For LOVE MUFFIN!"

And they all headed off to the elevator, whose doors opened for them at that exact moment. Piling in as best they could, one of them pressed the button for the 45th floor.

Then the doors closed with an innocent _ding, _and they were gone.

* * *

><p>While all this was going on, Perry was seated at the coffee table, fiddling with the bobble head toy while he waited for Doofenshmirtz to get off the phone. He was getting slightly agitated now, because he didn't know how he had accidentally called LOVE MUFFIN, and often when there is something you do not know and it gives you a bad feeling, it's the kind of thing you want to find out about as quickly as possible.<p>

He set the toy down and stared at his hands for a moment instead. They turned over and over, fingers tapping restlessly. He looked back up at the kitchen doorway, wondering if he could possibly will Doofenshmirtz to come back in. He did have a pretty strong will.

As he did this, there came a small clicking noise from the door, like a key turning in the lock. The door opened ever so slightly, then swung open wide enough for someone to push a small box through. The box slid in silently against the floor, and the door swung shut immediately with a tiny _thump._ But it was enough for Perry. His gaze snapped to the door, and upon seeing the box, he raised an eyebrow.

_A trap? _he mused suspiciously. _Already?_

For the box was so obviously a trap, Perry hardly had to think about it. The thing had bars on the outside that looked metallic and very thick, and a can of platypus food dangling from a string on the inside. The can was cracked open ever so slightly, releasing all the smells from within. Since he hadn't had lunch yet, Perry had to admit that it was rather tempting to sneak inside and attempt to retrieve the food- but even with all his secret agent training, he did tend to fall for traps sometimes. If he wanted food, he wasn't going to get it by doing something so stupid. And besides, there was only one person who would put the box there and expect him to fall for it- and Perry wasn't going to give him the satisfaction.

"Who does he think I am, Perry the Idiot?" he huffed. Yes, something would have to be done about the cage, if only to give Doofenshmirtz the clue that he wasn't going to be trapped so easily. For a moment, he examined the thing from a distance, and then he picked up the bobble head and a notepad with a smirk.

_**CLANG!**_

"We got 'im, boys!" shouted one of the minions excitedly. The others all shushed him, and then the leader slipped his master key back into the door and opened it a crack. They all peered into the room, which was empty- except for the now closed box.

"I think we did get him!" one of them whispered. They all grinned and stepped boldly into the room. Doofenshmirtz must have still been on the phone, because he didn't come out of the kitchen, even as they all surrounded the box and guffawed loudly.

"So much for mister big shot secret agent," one of them gloated.

"Just a little ducky-thing after all, aren't you?" another said smugly.

"Hush, boys," said the leader, but he was smirking just as much as the others. "Let's have a little look at our catch."

And a few of them lifted the cage, which was surprisingly light, to the leader's eye line. He peered in with a callous grin, but the moment he saw the inside of the cage, it faltered.

"You idiots!" he hissed, still keeping his voice low. "Look at this!" And he tugged the cage door open and pulled out a bobble head version of Perry with a note tied to it.

The others all stared, a bit crestfallen. One took the note and read it aloud to the group.

"_Lassie called, and she wants her kennel back,_" he sounded out each word carefully. They all raised their eyebrows.

The leader scowled. "Well, well. He's craftier than we anticipated."

"And good at making jokes," one of the minions added.

"Smarter than the average platypus, huh, boss?" another said jokingly.

This earned him a hard glare from his superior, and he fell silent instantly. Then the boss regained his composure and gazed around the room slowly, looking for his elusive prey. At last, his eyes landed on a nearby armchair, underneath of which the very edge of a peach colored tail could be seen if you looked hard enough.

"I'm going in," the leader instructed in a low whisper, nodding at the armchair. Getting the idea, his comrades nodded, and he crouched to try and get Perry out. But even before he could get to his knees, a sudden streak of teal shot out from under the chair and knocked him right off his feet, and he fell on his back with a loud "OOMPH!"

The other minions all whipped around to stare at the bristling Perry, who had finally shown himself. He was on all fours in a fighting stance, his muscles tensed in preparation to spring once more. Some of the men helped their leader to his feet, while the others pulled out their various nets and prepared for a fight.

"Come and get it, ducky-thing!" said one of them tauntingly. In response, Perry just narrowed his eyes, leapt high into the air, and gave him a good slap in the face with his tail. With a little shriek, he too fell to the floor, and Perry landed behind him on two feet. He turned to face the others and assumed a fighting stance, staring from one to the next with a slightly unsettled countenance. Judging by their badges, they had to be from LOVE MUFFIN- so did that mean they had set the trap and not Doofenshmirtz?

Maybe activating that trap had been a bad idea.

Choosing to ignore that, Perry whipped around and swept one man's feet with his tail, following up with a swift kick to someone else's incoming net. The others all seemed to get the same idea and tried to launch various attacks at the secret agent, who countered, blocked, or dodged them all, always returning the favor with a stinging attack of his own. Several minions crashed into each other and got each other tangled in their fish nets. A few others all tried to throw their nets on Perry, but he caught them in mid air and threw them right back. Anyone who challenged him in hand-to-hand combat wound up winded on the floor, and a good deal of shouting filled the room after each attack.

At some point, Perry accidentally crashed into the seafood that had been delivered earlier, resulting in a huge scuffle in which several minions wound up with crabs stuck to their ears. One tried to swing his crab net at Perry, but the platypus merely flipped backward and avoided it. The net landed right on top of one of the spilled hard crabs, whose pincer subsequently became attached to it. The man carrying the net raised it to have a look and frowned.

"Well, I got a bite," he stated blandly. Then Perry tackled his legs and knocked him to the ground.

Another man tried to throw his fish net on top of the platypus, who picked up a fish from the bag and threw it straight into the net, effectively stopping its momentum and causing it to fall to the ground harmlessly. As Perry flipped off to battle someone else, the man who had thrown the net raised an eyebrow in disbelief.

"Aww, the boss was right," he muttered ruefully. "Actual weapons would have been way better."

Just then, Perry became engaged in a swordfight between him and one of the minions, who was using his crab net's handle as a weapon. Perry was countering it with a large fish, but he was gradually being driven backwards. Eventually, he threw the fish in the man's face and dashed off down the hallway, hotly pursued by the rest of the minions.

"Why didn't any of you bring a platypus net?" their leader berated as they ran.

"They have such a thing?" one man questioned.

"Am I the only one who did the research?" said the other patronizingly. "Honestly. Now watch how it's done!" And he stopped at the doorway to Doofenshmirtz's storage room and pulled a long, stick-like object out from his pocket. As the others all chased after Perry, who had dashed into the lab, the man began to set up his trap. He latched one side of the stick to the doorframe, then pulled the other end across and attached it to the other side. The finished result looked like some kind of miniature tennis net.

"There," the captain muttered in satisfaction, stepping back to admire his work. "A worthy platypus-trap if I do say so myself."

And he stepped over the net carefully to hide in the storage room.

Meanwhile, Doofenshmirtz had by now gotten off the phone, and he was feeling rather nervous. His mood did not improve when he entered the living room and found that it was a complete mess, Perry was gone, and there was an immense amount of shouting and crashing coming from down the hall. A crab scuttled past his foot, and he gaped.

He groaned. "Oh, great, they're here already! Norm!"

"Yes, sir?" Norm asked from another room.

"Drop whatever you're doing and get over here. The council's driving me crazy, and I need somebody to back me up when I call to complain!"

"In a moment, sir," Norm replied.

Doofenshmirtz just headed off down the hall. "This can't be anything but trouble."

In the storage room, the leader of the minions was hidden cleverly behind a particularly large machine, where he could hear the sound of running feet in the hallway. The noise got louder and louder until finally, it was right outside the door, and then there was a loud chatter and a _THUMP. _That was followed by several other _thumps_, all in a row, as if some of the other minions had gotten caught as well.

"Ah-HA!" the man shouted, and he leapt out from behind the machine. But what he saw greatly displeased him; there was indeed a platypus stuck in the net (and several minions sprawled on top of him), but it wasn't Perry. It was just a random platypus. The secret agent was busy battling a few more men who had caught up with him, apparently after jumping over the net.

The leader stared in complete bafflement. "Okay, I know you guys were catching seafood in your nets, but this just doesn't make any sense!"

While they were examining the failed attempt at a trap, the sound of running feet filled the hallway once more, and Doofenshmirtz came to a halt in front of the door.

"Perry the Platypus, what in the world are you doing?" he asked, eyes wide. Perry, however, didn't seem to notice he was there, and the battle continued uninterrupted. Doofenshmirtz scowled. He took a deep breath.

"HEY!" he yelled loudly. Everyone in the room froze in place and turned to stare at him, even Perry, whose fist was poised perfectly over one minion's nose.

Doofenshmirtz seemed satisfied. "So, anyone feel like explaining what's going on?"

Across the room, Perry narrowed his eyes. "I'm kind of busy, if you haven't noticed." And he subsequently finished his punch to the man's nose.

With that, the battle began anew. Doofenshmirtz growled and yelled, "NORM! Seriously, get over here!" Then he had to shout some more to get one of the minions to listen to him.

"What are you guys doing here?" he demanded. "Did the council send you?"

"Yes, sir," the man responded promptly. "We were told that you needed our assistance, and that we were supposed to capture a platypus."

"Yeah, that's my nemesis. And he wasn't even doing anything until you guys showed up!" Doofenshmirtz fumed. Behind him, Perry performed a very complicated tornado kick and knocked one man out cold. Annoyed, Doofenshmirtz whipped around and yelled, "Oh, will you shut up for a second? I'm trying to talk!"

Perry paused, gave a quick, exasperated eye roll, and kept going- albeit in a quieter manner.

Doofenshmirtz returned to his conversation, feeling exasperated. "So where was I?" he continued. "Oh, yeah. I was just saying, I have everything under control."

The other man raised an eyebrow as Perry rode past on one minion's shoulders, pecking him repeatedly on the head. "I can see that…but we don't disobey direct orders. Don't worry, we'll get him." With that, he dashed off to rejoin the fight.

"That's what I'm worried about!" Doofenshmirtz called after him. Then he grumbled, "All I know is, one way or another, something is going to explode."

Just then, there was a loud crash, and he turned to see that the minion Perry was riding on had finally bucked him off, and he had crashed into the Time Transporter-Inator's control pad. The doors opened, and Perry immediately leapt away from them like they had the plague. Just then, several more minions came rushing at him, and he dashed back towards it. At the last moment, he turned and slid underneath their feet, tripping the last one to cause a chain reaction as he went. The men all collapsed on top of each other inside the machine, and Perry, thinking fast, quickly reached for the control switch.

"No, no, no, Perry the Platypus, wait!" Doofenshmirtz yelled, waving his arms frantically, but it was too late- Perry had pressed the button. The machine quickly lit up, beeping and shaking like it would burst, and then, before you could say 'bad idea'-

_FLASH!_

When the light from the machine cleared, everything seemed the same, except for the disappearance of five or six minions. One of the men blinked.

"What just happened?" he asked, stunned.

"I don't know, but Joe's gone," said another, anger building in his voice. "And _he _did it!" And he pointed a finger at Perry in an accusatory manner.

Perry seemed about to retort when Doofenshmirtz intervened. "Uh, guys?" he said, effectively cutting off whatever his nemesis was about to say. "There's something you should know about the Time Transporter-Inator…it tends to explode after you use it twice."

For a moment, Perry and the minions simply stared at him. Then Perry burst out, "Well, why on earth didn't you fix that when you rebuilt it?"

Doofenshmirtz shrugged. "I don't know, I guess I forgot."

Just then, a loud, intimidating voice emanated from the Inator.

_**AUTOMATIC SELF DESTRUCT ACTIVATED, **_the voice claimed. _**TEN…NINE…EIGHT…SEVEN…**_

"See? You see what I mean?" Doofenshmirtz demanded, gesturing wildly. "Norm, where the heck _are_ you?"

_**SIX…FIVE…FOUR…**_

"Forget Norm!" Perry shouted over the noise of the countdown. "Run for it!" And he did, dashing straight past the bewildered minions to a nearby window. Doofenshmirtz followed as best he could and they both tried to get a window open, before Perry gave up and merely shattered his with a sharp kick. He then turned, saluted his nemesis, and dived out of the window. Doofenshmirtz struggled with the other window for a moment, then gave up and ran to the one Perry had broken.

Behind him, the minions' leader seemed to get the clue as well. "RETREAT!" he bellowed loudly, and with that, they all began to throw themselves out of various windows like lemmings, activating heretofore unseen parachutes on the way down. Soon, Doofenshmirtz was alone in the building, wondering why _he _didn't have an official LOVE MUFFIN parachute.

_**THREE…TWO…ONE…**_

There was nothing for it. He'd have to jump. "Curse you, Perry the Platypus!" he yelled out the window, shaking his fist as he did.

_**ZERO.**_

With that, the Time Transporter-Inator built up a huge amount of energy, trembled for a moment, and promptly exploded with a glass-shattering, eardrum-rattling _**BANG!**_ At the last second, Doofenshmirtz jumped out of the window after Perry, and the entire top floor of Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated went up in flames behind them.

Doofenshmirtz watched the explosions with an almost bored visage. "I knew something would explode," he mused. "And the fire was predictable. But falling? Didn't see that coming."

As he plummeted towards the busy Danville street below, something else began to fall beside him; something large, metallic, and extremely late.

"Hello, sir!" said Norm, and he waved as if everything was fine.

"Norm!" Doofenshmirtz exclaimed, grinning. "Well, it's about time! Turn yourself into a jet, will you? We need to get out of here."

"Yes, sir." And the robot quickly obeyed. His arms flattened out to become the wings of an airplane, his body expanded into a cockpit and his legs widened into additional wings, and a top hatch opened to let Doofenshmirtz in. He then flew directly under the evil scientist, who grabbed the open hatch and pulled himself into the robot-turned-jet plane.

"Of the very few upgrades I have given you through these years," Doofenshmirtz commented as he settled in with a satisfied smile, "This one is definitely my favorite."

"So what did I miss?" asked Norm's robotic voice inside the jet.

Doofenshmirtz replied as he strapped himself in. "Oh, you wouldn't know, since I called you a billion times and you never showed up! It's LOVE MUFFIN, they're being difficult. Honestly! Like I can't handle my own nemesis." He snorted derisively.

"So silly of them," Norm commented. Then he asked a question that the doctor surely had not anticipated. "What about your falling friend?"

Doofenshmirtz growled. "I already told you, he's not my friend!" he scolded the robot. "Don't you remember anything about Perry the Platypus? He's the one I built you to destroy, remember?"

"Actually, my memory needs upgrading," Norm answered. Doofenshmirtz paused.

"Oh, yeah. When _was_ the last time I upgraded your memory circuits?" he wondered. "For all I know, if I don't do it soon, you'll forget your own name."

"My name is Norm!" said Norm happily.

Doofenshmirtz smiled. "Well, maybe you won't forget _that_."

"So what about your friend who is not your friend?" Norm persisted.

"Enough about him!" Doofenshmirtz scoffed. However, there was an agitated sort of air about him that seemed to contradict his defiant attitude. He looked out the window at Perry, who was still falling far below them (it was a very, very long drop from Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated). The wind was pushing wildly at him from all directions, making his short fur appear to ripple in the sunlight and threatening to steal his hat. He must have forgotten to bring his parachute, because by now he should have activated it already.

"Would you like me to rescue him?" asked Norm.

Doofenshmirtz gave a start at this. "No way!" he shot back immediately. "He's let me blow up plenty of times. Let him fall alone for once!"

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, I'm sure.

"Are you sure that you're sure?"

"I'm sure, Norm."

"Are you sure that you're sure of being sure?"

Doofenshmirtz stared for a moment, working that out in his head. "Uh…sure."

"But are you su-"

"ARGH! Cut it out, Norm!" Doofenshmirtz shouted in frustration, leaning back in the driver's seat with a sulky frown. For a moment, he battled with himself, trying to think why he should or shouldn't save Perry. On the one hand, if he didn't, Perry would probably save himself somehow, and then he'd hunt the doctor down and fuss at him- whereas if he did save his enemy, LOVE MUFFIN might try to catch him again and ignore any plans Doofenshmirtz had for him.

But just then, something else came to him- a distant memory from the first time he had ever met Perry. The time Perry had saved his life out of sheer mercy, fourteen years ago, even though they had only just met. And then, many other times when the agent had come back for him when his plans were about to explode, saved him from falling, or even just helped him with trivial things like his daughter's birthday party. The thought of it all made him squirm.

A persistent sense of guilt began to overcome him, and he groaned in defeat. "Oh, all _right, _if you _insist!_ But only because you're getting on my nerves, got it?"

"Yes, sir," said Norm, and he instantly dived straight down to catch up with Perry.

Far below, Perry was still falling and trying desperately to find his parachute. So far, he had found an inflatable raft with a large hole in it, a generic ray gun for if he was ever in a tight spot, a set of metal teeth for biting through traps, and- oddly enough- a rubber chicken, but no parachute.

"What the heck is this doing here?" he shouted as he stared at the wildly jiggling toy, before throwing it behind him and continuing to search for some sort of portable aircraft. If only he had thought to take something from the lab to use as a makeshift glider- a long sheet of metal, a pipe to slide along telephone wires with, anything that could possibly save him. He wasn't picky. He didn't know what had happened to Doofenshmirtz, but he suspected that they were both about to suffer the same fate, and it wasn't a pleasant one.

As the ground got closer and closer, he gave up on trying to find his parachute and glanced wildly around for something that he could latch on to, only to realize that he had forgotten to bring his grappling gun as well. So he curled himself into a ball and covered his head as best he could, hoping desperately that something, anything, would intervene and help him.

He wasn't expecting that something to be his worst enemy.

One minute, he was feeling the wind rushing through his fur, and the next, he had landed on something soft that abruptly cut off his fall. The impact, though not nearly as hard as it would have been if he had landed on the street, was still enough to jar his senses and stop his breathing for a moment, and when he hit the surface, he bounced slightly.

All he could do was listen dazedly as someone nearby shouted, "Pull up, Norm! UP!"

"I'm trying, sir."

"I knew this was a bad idea!"

Then there was a swooping, nauseating sensation that silenced everyone, and before he knew it, Perry was leaning back in a cushioned seat as the craft zoomed back up above whatever danger it faced to safety, finally leveling out into a smooth flight. A moment of silence followed, and he opened one eye cautiously to see just what was going on.

To his confusion, he was sitting in the back seat of what he assumed was a jet plane, flying over Danville at a huge altitude. The interior of the jet was a dark blue, and there were wide windows on all sides, in order to get the maximum aerial view. The whole scenario was rather shocking, but what surprised him most was not that someone had saved him from certain doom- it was _who _had saved him that made him stare.

There, sitting in the front seat with a conflicted frown, was Doofenshmirtz. He looked relieved and scared at the same time, as if he was afraid of what Perry would think of him. As if in his defense, he pointed accusingly at the dashboard of the jet.

"It was Norm's idea!" he claimed, as if the robot was actually there.

Norm's voice promptly emanated from the jet's speaker system. "Yes, but you agreed to it."

"I just went along with it because you were driving me _crazy!_" Doofenshmirtz insisted, glaring at the dashboard stubbornly. Perry just watched them go back and forth over the issue, until he finally regained enough breath to speak up.

"Uh, Doof," he started uncertainly. Doofenshmirtz immediately ceased arguing with Norm, and he turned to hear what Perry had to say.

Perry looked somewhat like a child who was being forced to apologize to someone. His tail flicked back and forth uncomfortably. "First off, we must never speak of this again."

Doofenshmirtz nodded fervently. "Agreed."

Then Perry waited for an awkward moment, looked at his feet, and mumbled, "And second…thanks. For saving me, I mean."

For a moment, Doofenshmirtz stared, unsure he had heard correctly. Then he smirked. "Hey, you know what? Now you owe me big time!"

Perry looked up, outraged. "Excuse me? How many times have I saved _your _life in the past, and you never once repaid me up 'til now? You're the one who still owes me."

"Nuh-uh!" said Doofenshmirtz, sticking out his lower lip in a pout.

"Wasn't it Norm's idea anyway?" Perry pointed out, crossing his arms with a little smile.

Doofenshmirtz was at a loss for words for a moment. At last, he sputtered, "Well, I agreed to it!"

Perry merely scoffed and quickly looked out the window to avoid any further conversation that might ensue. Doofenshmirtz, noticing the sudden silence, immediately assumed that he had won and grinned in triumph.

"Gotcha there, huh?" he said smugly.

Perry didn't directly reply to the statement. "Okay, I have a question," he said, trying to bring them back to the matter at hand. "What's with the jet plane?"

Doofenshmirtz seemed happy to be asked about the craft, and he patted one of the seats affectionately. "Oh, it's Norm! I gave him an upgrade, like one of those Transmorphers or whatever they are. Cool, huh? It's got all kinds of stuff- satellite radio, ten speeds, a fridge in the back- ooh! And I even installed a hands-free phone system on it, see?"

He indicated a screen on the dashboard, which was currently blank. Underneath it was a set of numbers like one would see on a cell phone. As Perry tried to keep his face blank, for fear of betraying the fact that he thought it _was _somewhat cool, there was a ringing noise from the set. Doofenshmirtz perked up and glanced at the screen, which now displayed a logo that read, _Incoming call._

"Wow, perfect timing, huh?" Doofenshmirtz remarked. "So Norm, who's calling?"

"LOVE MUFFIN, sir," Norm's mechanical voice replied. "They want to talk to you."

Doofenshmirtz's scowl was back right away. "I hope it's to apologize for demolishing my building," he muttered in irritation. "I mean, seriously! That was totally uncalled for."

In the back seat, Perry's muscles tensed, and he narrowed his eyes in an unsettled manner. "Norm, did you say it's LOVE MUFFIN calling?"

"Yes, yes I did," Norm answered. "I'll put them on now."

"No, wait!" Perry shouted, but it was too late; the screen lit up with a picture of a U-shaped table, around which an assembly of lab-coat wearing scientists sat. At the head of the table was a man with a distinctively bald head and a disapproving frown.

"Oh, hi again, Rodney," Doofenshmirtz addressed the man distastefully.

"Ah, Doofenshmirtz and company," Rodney said in a condescending tone. "That was very unexpected, Heinz. Saving your own nemesis…how compassionate."

Then his expression shifted suddenly to disapproval. "We're disgusted."

Doofenshmirtz looked offended. "I just told him, it was Norm's idea!" he insisted, pointing at the dashboard once more. "He was driving me crazy over it!"

"You're very conflicted over this, aren't you?" Norm quipped.

"Doofenshmirtz, this is going far too far," Rodney replied coldly. "Regretfully, we must end this nonsense."

Perry directed a glare at his nemesis. "I should have known you'd try something! You only saved me so you could take me back to your headquarters and get rid of me or something, didn't you?"

Doofenshmirtz put his hands up in surrender, seeming panicked. "I didn't call them, I tell you! They're calling me! Would you stop blaming me for this stuff?"

"You're the one who took over the Tri-State Area and brought me to this stupid future!" Perry snapped. "I have every right to blame you!"

As the two of them bickered, Norm's voice came over the speakers. "It seems they're busy. Can I take a message?"

"Oh, he'll listen," Rodney replied coolly. Then he cleared his throat. "Heinz! Due to your unreliable behavior, we have been forced to come to a conclusion regarding your status."

Doofenshmirtz froze in the middle of leaning into the back seat to put Perry in his place. "What?" he sputtered. "But I thought we were going to do something about _him_!" he indicated Perry, ignoring the impudent glare he was now receiving from the platypus.

Rodney's expression was now very serious. "Doctor Heinz Doofenshmirtz," he began solemnly, "you are hereby expelled from the LOVE MUFFIN council."

"EXPELLED?" Doofenshmirtz shouted, immediately rushing back to the front seat and gaping at his former colleague in shock. Even Perry seemed stunned, but he didn't speak.

Rodney's face betrayed no sympathy whatsoever. "Yes, expelled. Should you bring your nemesis to us, we will spare you, but if you continue to shelter him, you will be considered his accomplice and the two of you will be hunted. Please make your decision before sundown, as the rest of us will still be having that feast and we don't want to have to take work home with us. Now, I think that's all…does anyone have anything to add?"

There was a long silence in the jet, broken only by one of the evil scientists on the other end whispering loudly, "Cough-traitor-cough!"

Doofenshmirtz bristled. "Hey, I heard that!" he responded indignantly. Then his expression shifted to a pleading one. "Come on, guys! You can't just kick me out!"

"Oh, no. Really?" said Rodney in mock sympathy. "Because I think we just did."

And with that, the screen fizzed out and was replaced by blackness, with only a blinking white message displayed on it: **HOURS UNTIL SUNDOWN: APRX. 4**

Doofenshmirtz kept staring at the screen in total shock. Behind him, Perry relaxed his muscles and leaned back in his seat with a blank, emotionless expression. Both of their thoughts were twisted beyond their comprehension, and neither quite knew what to think.

Slowly, Doofenshmirtz twisted in his seat, glaring at the astonished Perry in the back seat. The silence reigned for a moment more.

Then he exploded, "This is _SO _your fault!"

Emotion rapidly flooded back into Perry's face, and he shouted in outrage, "_My _fault? You're the one who called your minions on me, so I fought to protect myself!"

"I did _not! _And besides, you blew up my entire building!"

"That was purely accidental, and you know it!" Perry retorted heatedly, his face flushed with anger. "I didn't know your stupid machine would do that, it's your own fault for not telling me sooner! And you're the one who rescued me from falling!"

"Well, I-" Doofenshmirtz started, then stopped abruptly with a confused frown. "Wait, does that even apply to this?"

Perry blinked. "I…don't know." He seemed about to think of something else to accuse the doctor of, but in the middle of it, a yawn escaped him. Suddenly, he realized just how tired he was.

"Doof, look," he said, stretching quickly, "I've had a long day, and I'm exhausted from all this arguing. Can we stop now?"

Doofenshmirtz looked stunned. "Oh. Well…I guess so?"

And with that, Perry nodded in appreciation, turned away from the befuddled doctor, and huddled up in the corner of the jet. His hat tipped low over his eyes, but from the slit that could be seen, it was obvious that he was still watching Doofenshmirtz intently. Doofenshmirtz blinked, then retreated to the front seat. Apparently, the fight was over.

While the doctor muttered to himself about the 'stupid council' and how they had no right to kick him out just for giving in to Norm, the robot spoke up. "Does this mean we're fugitives?"

Perry twitched. Doofenshmirtz looked up, as if this had just occurred to him. He gulped. "Well, if we don't give in to their demands…yeah, I guess we are."

Perry snorted. "You mean _I _am. You can just go crawling back to them, and they won't hurt you. They only care if you keep traveling with me, which we both know isn't going to happen."

Doofenshmirtz turned with a distressed frown, gesturing wildly. "Yeah, but then I won't be part of LOVE MUFFIN anymore! I'll be a regular citizen! I'll…I'll…" he searched for another good reason. "I'll lose my club membership benefits!"

Perry lifted the brim of his hat to get a better look at the doctor and cocked an eyebrow. "I'd say that's a good thing. Danville could use a little less tyranny."

Doofenshmirtz growled and turned back to the dashboard, resting his head in his hands. "We can talk later, okay? I've got a sore throat from all this shouting." He sighed. "So I guess we've got to go somewhere for the night…and if we stay at some public place, LOVE MUFFIN will track you down…"

"Why would you care?" Perry asked quizzically.

Doofenshmirtz struggled for a good reason for a moment. Then he snapped, "Because sooner or later, I plan on bringing you in myself! Yeah, that's it. Because then I'll get to be a full member of LOVE MUFFIN again, I'll finally get to eliminate you, and I can ensure the eternal rule of the League of Villainous Evildoers Maniacally United-"

"Doof, seriously," Perry interrupted, cutting him off effectively. "You know perfectly well I'll just escape."

Doofenshmirtz let out a stressed breath. "I liked you _way _better when you didn't talk."

Just then, Norm spoke up unexpectedly. "Sir, is there somewhere you would like to go?" the robot asked pleasantly.

Doofenshmirtz turned away from Perry and thought for a moment. Then he perked up. "Oh, I've got it! Norm, go back to the city."

"Yes, sir."

Perry seemed unsettled. "Where are you going?" he asked in a low, suspicious voice. No doubt LOVE MUFFIN's headquarters was somewhere in the city. Doofenshmirtz could still be bluffing about not wanting them to track him down.

Doofenshmirtz seemed rather cheerful now. "To the corner of fifth and Broad Street- otherwise known as my daughter's apartment building."

Perry blinked. Well, that sounded okay, he guessed. "At least she won't try to trap me in a kennel."

He didn't see Doofenshmirtz frown, as if he wished she would.

_To be continued…_


	5. The Other Doctor Doofenshmirtz

It was an ordinary day in downtown Danville; and although that meant daily boredom and misery for the regular citizens, for those with connections, it meant doing whatever you desired for as long as you liked.

So it was for Vanessa Doofenshmirtz, who was currently lounging in her apartment and listening to very loud heavy metal music. She had just gotten back home from hanging out with her friends, who were even moodier than usual because of LOVE MUFFIN's rule. Thankfully, they didn't hold any grudges against her because of her father- mostly because they didn't know he was her father. As beneficial as it was to be related to a member of the organization, she hadn't told them about her father holding the position for fear of what they would think of her. The minute he took over the Tri-State Area, she had insisted on moving out, and he rarely visited anymore because he was so busy. However, she considered this a good thing; even after eight years, he still accidentally embarrassed her on nearly every occasion that he got the chance. All the same, there were occasional times when she missed her father.

This was not one of them.

For today, Vanessa was relaxed on her couch with her headphones on, mouthing the lyrics to her favorite song as it played on her Ipod and not thinking about her father at all. At that moment, she didn't have a care in the world.

_Ding-dong._

_Knock, knock, knock._

It took a moment for her to take notice of the sound, but as soon as she did, she pulled the headphones off and looked up at the door. Why would anyone visit her at this time of day? The only people who ever visited were her friends, and they had just seen her. Besides all that, she didn't know anyone who knocked _and _rang the doorbell, rather than one or the other- it seemed like the kind of thing you would do if you wanted to get someone's attention very badly.

Curious, she rose to her feet and strode to the door to find out who was there. Upon reaching it, she activated the electronic peephole and peered at the screen with great interest- but what she saw made her blink and take a step backward.

"Dad?" she murmured to herself in surprise. For there on the doorstep was Dr. Doofenshmirtz, looking worried and glancing behind himself now and then. For a moment, Vanessa mentally debated what to do about him. Every time he visited, something seemed to go wrong; but her friends weren't here, so he couldn't humiliate her in front of them, and with no one to come and try to blow him up, explosions were probably out of the question. And maybe, with a little luck, he wouldn't even do any mad experiments during the visit.

Deeming it to be safe, Vanessa confirmed her decision and opened the door. As soon as she did so, Doofenshmirtz looked up with a relieved expression.

"Oh, Vanessa!" he said happily, the worried frown melting away as he leaned in to give her a hug. "It's so good to see you again, sweetie!"

"Dad, what are you doing here?" Vanessa asked, locked in her father's embrace. "You hardly ever visit…did you get a day off work?"

Then something about the doctor seemed to change, and he pulled away, looking slightly nervous again. "Oh, you're not going to believe this one. But we can't talk out here…" He glanced up and down the hallway outside the apartment, as if afraid that someone would hear him. Vanessa raised an eyebrow.

"Dad, have you gotten in trouble with the rebels again?" she inquired testily.

Doofenshmirtz shook his head. "No, no, it's not them. It's something else-" he seemed to catch himself, and quickly corrected the sentence. "Er, some_one _else."

Vanessa's suspicious frown deepened. "What, now there's someone other than the rebels that has a grudge against you? You have _got _to stop making new enemies, Dad."

"Actually, he's not a 'new' enemy," said Doofenshmirtz, seeming a little awkward. "He's out in the car- at least, I hope he still is…" he considered that for a moment, then let out a small sigh and continued. "Anyway, after I go get him, we need to talk."

"You're going to go get him?" Vanessa answered, a slight note of alarm in her voice. But even as she called after him, the doctor had already departed for the elevator.

_What kind of enemy would Dad bring on a visit to my house? _she wondered uneasily. Only one came to mind, but that couldn't even be considered a possibility. From what she knew, he had simply vanished; and there was nothing anyone could do to bring him back.

* * *

><p>Back at the corner of Fifth and Broad, Norm the robot was parked in car form on the side of the street and attracting many strange stares from passersby. Having become bored, he had turned on the radio, which was currently playing a song called <em>Dictators in Danville<em>. Inside the car, Perry was curled up in the back seat, trying hard to ignore the world around him (and in particular, the dreary song on the radio).

As he contemplated the situation, it occurred to him that he was feeling unusually nervous. The cause wasn't that he didn't want to see Vanessa again, as she had always been nice to them on the occasions that they met- at least, she didn't despise him like her father did. The issue, he decided, was that he was uneasy about visiting her if Doofenshmirtz was in the same place. Who knew what kind of treachery the evil scientist would employ when he got the chance. In order to avoid this, Perry decided he'd have to escape as soon as possible, whenever no one was paying attention to him. But even after that, he realized, he didn't know what to do or where to go. For all he knew, he could wander aimlessly for days, stopping only to be captured and eliminated by LOVE MUFFIN. Or, worse yet, Doofenshmirtz might seriously attempt to bring him in himself, and Perry knew that he tended to fall for a lot of the doctor's traps (although in more normal situations, he had actually let himself get caught rather often). He groaned inwardly. Why was everything so difficult?

_Dictators in Daaaaanville…_ the song crooned, while a whining electric guitar played in the background. _Don't know what to doooooo…_

_Wish I knew what to do…_ Perry thought gloomily.

_But soon our troubles will be go-o-one…and the rebels will rescue me and yoooou…_

At this, Perry pricked up his ears. _Rebels? _If the song was telling the truth…

But before he had the chance to explore that possibility, there was a sudden knock on the window and he looked up to see Doofenshmirtz, who had just returned.

The doctor said something to Norm that Perry couldn't hear through the glass, and Norm replied, "Yes, sir. I'll tell him." Doofenshmirtz nodded and stepped back, and Norm's voice came over the interior speaker system once more. "Doctor D says you should activate your disguise."

Perry raised an eyebrow. "My what?" He had plenty of disguises, most of which he had forfeited at some point. As he had left his lair without packing the necessary gear on the day he was transported to the future, he didn't have any disguises left except for his mindless pet guise- and Doofenshmirtz couldn't have known about that. However, Norm seemed to be convinced otherwise.

"Your disguise," he repeated, in exactly the same mechanical tone and cadence. "Would you like me to tell you how to use it?"

Perry simply stared at the dashboard at the front of the car for a moment, completely lost. Then he recalled something that Doofenshmirtz had once said, and it clicked- Norm was probably talking about the Translator-Inator that Perry was wearing, which doubled as a Disguise-Inator. He had no idea why Doofenshmirtz had decided to build such a thing, but it was certainly proving itself to be useful.

"Oh, this." He quickly raised a hand to the device and fingered its two buttons to get a feel for it. "Actually, yeah. I think I could use a walkthrough."

"Then let's get started!" said Norm. "First, press the green button to switch the mode."

Perry unclipped the device and pressed the button, then slipped it back onto the brim of his hat. "Done."

"The disguise system is activated through voice commands," Norm continued, as if the instruction manual had been programmed directly into his circuits (and perhaps it had). "It contains six default disguises, but you can add more! To activate a disguise, speak the title of the disguise- in this case, Default One, Two, Three, Four, Five, or Six. The system operates through holographics and very advanced circuitry-"

"Okay, okay, I'm ready," Perry interrupted, prepared to activate the device. He cleared his throat. "Default One."

There was a whirring noise and a quiet _beep_, and then the device fell absolutely silent. Perry frowned. "Well, did it do anything? I don't feel any different…"

"Let's have a look!" Norm replied cheerfully, and a handheld mirror on a spring popped out of the floor of the vehicle, coming to a halt at Perry's line of sight. However, its reflection didn't show Perry- it showed a middle-aged man, seated in the same position as the secret agent, but looking completely different. He wore a crisp suit, as if he was about to head off to work, and his graying hair was carefully combed. Perry's jaw dropped in amazement, and in Norm's mirror, so did the man's. Alarmed, he pulled the device off of his hat, and the reflection shifted to a small teal platypus who looked rather stunned. Perry let out a puff of breath in relief, glad to be himself again and not a stranger. He had worn many strange disguises before, but this one took the cake.

He took a deep breath and prepared to try another one. "This is going to be weird."

Outside the car, Doofenshmirtz tapped his foot impatiently as he waited for Perry to finish using the Disguise-Inator. From the brief and insistent flashes that kept lighting up the windows of the car, he assumed that Perry was trying out all the disguises and hadn't settled on one yet, and the wait was beginning to make him nervous.

"How long does it take to try out six disguises?" he muttered. "And half of them are for girls anyway…I mean, seriously! It's a simple choice!"

However, the moment he finished speaking, Norm's side door opened. Out stepped a teenage boy with lank blond hair and gray clothing, who the doctor never would have recognized if he hadn't been wearing the deadly serious frown that Perry always sported.

Doofenshmirtz whistled in appreciation. "_Wow_, I'm good," he commented, obviously approving of the Disguise-Inator's results. "How it hid your tail, though, I'll never know."

Perry glanced behind himself with a slightly surprised expression, as if he hadn't noticed the visual absence of a tail. He turned back to the doctor and shrugged.

"Better than looking like a girl," he remarked, his frown quickly returning. "Okay, so if we're going somewhere, can we please just go there?"

Doofenshmirtz snickered quietly, wondering whether Perry was trying to sound like a teenager, or if that had just sort of happened. Then, clearing his throat, he tried to turn his pleased grin into a more serious expression like his nemesis'. "Oh, right. Follow me."

* * *

><p>A few minutes later on the sixth floor, the elevator arrived at its stop and opened its doors with a <em>ding<em>. Doofenshmirtz strode out, his lab coat swishing around his legs, and headed down the hall for Vanessa's apartment. Behind him, the still-disguised Perry peered out of the doors and glanced up and down the hallway suspiciously, as if he was afraid that someone might see him. When he saw that the place was empty except for Doofenshmirtz, he edged out into the hall and let the elevator doors close behind him. Then he followed Doofenshmirtz down the hall, glancing in every direction as his feet paced the rough, worn carpet silently. Doofenshmirtz glanced behind himself, just to make sure he was still there, and raised his eyebrows.

"Wow, you're quiet," he remarked. "How do you do that?"

"Do what?" Perry replied, in a low voice that didn't carry far.

"Walking," the doctor prompted. "You don't make any noise when you walk."

Perry gained a sort of proud smile. "I trained for years and years under a professional who could walk over anything without making a sound. I'm practically a ninja now. Only quieter."

Doofenshmirtz raised his eyebrows, looking impressed. "Wow, really? I mean, I already knew you were a ninja, but-"

"I was just kidding. It's this carpet."

Doofenshmirtz scoffed and kept walking, muttering about how he would change all his carpet floors to creaky linoleum when he got home, just so Perry couldn't sneak up on him anymore. Perry's expression reverted back to its usual seriousness, but there was still a trace of a smile on his features. Eight years in the future or no, some things would never change- and one of them was that he would forever irritate his enemy.

Soon, Doofenshmirtz came to a halt in front of a door, and behind him, Perry halted as well. The doctor reached up and rapped on the door sharply, the loud noise causing Perry to flinch and glance around suspiciously.

"Oh, would you just chill out?" Doofenshmirtz said, giving the agent a sort of 'are-you-kidding-me' look. "No one's coming. Seriously."

Perry looked at his feet, slightly abashed, but the minute Doofenshmirtz turned around, he was back on the alert. There was a short silence- and then, the door opened.

There stood Vanessa, smiling in a relieved, but almost nervous way. "Dad, you're back!" she greeted. Then she glanced behind him and noticed the disguised Perry, and she raised an eyebrow. "Um, is this the new enemy you were talking about?"

Perry and the doctor briefly exchanged glances, Doofenshmirtz trying to imagine what Vanessa must have thought of the teenage boy behind him and Perry wondering what she meant by 'new enemy'. Doofenshmirtz cleared his throat and spoke up.

"Sort of," he answered. "Can we talk about this inside?"

Vanessa nodded, still looking slightly confused. "Uh, okay. Come in…" And she opened the door a little wider to allow them to pass. Doofenshmirtz smiled and led the way, Perry following him at a short distance. As he passed Vanessa, Perry noted that eight years had had a significant impact on her appearance. She now wore a black business jacket and a pencil skirt, along with a pair of high-heeled shoes and thin-rimmed glasses. But although her attire had changed, she was still just as beautiful and stylish as she had been as a teenager. She watched him intently as he went, although her gaze was directed at the hologram boy's face far above Perry's head. He had to crane his neck to see her properly.

When they had all come inside, Vanessa closed the door behind them and Perry had a chance to look around the room. For an apartment, it was rather spacious (being related to a member of LOVE MUFFIN, no doubt Vanessa was allowed whatever kind of home she desired) and it was furnished in a very modern, sophisticated way.

Vanessa beckoned to her father to follow her. "Come on, we can talk in here." And she led them to the black leather couch in the center of the room, where they all sat around the mahogany coffee table.

"Okay, first things first," Vanessa started, leaning back on the couch and still looking slightly confused. "Dad, who's your…friend?"

Doofenshmirtz groaned in exasperation. "Why does everyone think you're my friend?" he complained to Perry, who looked bewildered.

"Do you know what he's talking about?" he asked Vanessa. "Because I'm lost."

"Okay, disregard all that," Doofenshmirtz said, waving his hands as if to clear away the matter. "No, we're not friends. He's definitely an enemy." In the middle of his sentence, he glanced around. "Wait, can we close the blinds? You never know who might be watching…"

And he got up to do just that. Vanessa raised an eyebrow. "What are you talking about?"

"After visiting the LOVE MUFFIN security room," Doofenshmirtz remarked as he pressed a button on the wall that closed all the blinds and curtains simultaneously, "I learned that when they say they're everywhere, they really are everywhere. Like Elvis."

Perry raised an eyebrow at the metaphor, but he knew Doofenshmirtz was probably right. Whether closing the blinds would help or not, he couldn't risk discovery. The only thing that still confused him was that Doofenshmirtz appeared to be trying to help.

_Whatever he's up to, I still don't trust him, _Perry thought to himself, resolving to keep his guard up. As he finished the thought, Doofenshmirtz strode back over to the table and sat down, glancing around suspiciously. Then he turned his attention to Perry.

"Okay, I think we're good," he said. "You can take off your disguise now."

For a moment, there was silence. Vanessa's confused expression turned to a stunned one. "Disguise? You mean he's not really a teenage guy?" she asked in disbelief. "Wow, good disguise…"

"Yeah, I know!" Doofenshmirtz commented happily. "I built it myself."

Vanessa frowned. "How do you 'build' a disguise?"

"Well, actually, I just built the Disguise-Inator," Doofenshmirtz corrected himself. "The hologram does the rest."

"It's a hologram?" Vanessa queried, looking more and more confused by the minute. "Then who…?"

As a response, Perry reached up and pressed a button on the Disguise-Inator, turning off the device and causing the hologram to fizz and disappear, leaving only himself.

Vanessa gasped. "Perry the Platypus?" Then she scowled. "Ugh, I'm turning into Dad."

Perry gave a wan smile. "Don't do that, Vanessa. I have enough trouble with one of him."

"But you disappeared years ago!" Vanessa protested, stunned again. "And why are you with Dad? And why are you talking? And why- oh, never mind. Somebody explain."

The nemeses exchanged uneasy glances. Perry sighed. "This is going to be a long night."

* * *

><p>It had already been late in the evening when the nemeses arrived at Vanessa's place, but it was even later when they finished their story. In fact, the sun was setting in earnest by the time Vanessa had gotten a thorough explanation of how Perry had disappeared, why he was back, why he was talking, and the events that had occurred at Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated. She was particularly shocked by her father's dismissal from LOVE MUFFIN, but the most confusing part of the story appeared to be the fact that Perry hadn't fled the situation yet to return to home base.<p>

"I thought your job was to foil his plans and leave," she asked. "So why haven't you tried to report back to headquarters, or gone home or something?"

Perry shook his head. "Doof told me about the Agency. I can't go back."

"Well, what about home?" Vanessa persisted. "Haven't you tried that yet?"

"He hasn't had the chance yet," Doofenshmirtz answered, before Perry could even open his mouth to reply. "It's just been explosions all the time, left and right, all day!"

Perry nodded, deciding not to explain the real reason why he couldn't go home. It would only result in him getting nostalgic about the boys, and he couldn't afford to show weakness in front of Doofenshmirtz.

"Oh," said Vanessa. Then she cleared her throat. "Well, after such a long day of explosions, you must be exhausted. Let's get some refreshments, okay?"

"Yeah, that sounds good," Doofenshmirtz answered immediately, cheerful as usual. Perry just nodded, not feeling very talkative anymore.

Vanessa nodded, stood up, and clapped her hands twice. "ASA! Come here!"

Perry raised an eyebrow, puzzled. "ASA? What's that?" he asked. Vanessa didn't have time to reply, as Doofenshmirtz interrupted immediately.

"Oh, speaking of ASA, how is it?" he inquired. "Circuits functioning correctly and all?"

"Yeah, it's fine," Vanessa answered.

_What are they talking about? _Perry wondered in confusion. _Is it some kind of robot?_

Just then, there was a humming noise, and he looked up to one of the strangest things he had seen yet- a floating metal ball, sporting a single mechanical arm that was carrying a tray of drinks. On the surface of the ball were two spots of light, like eyes, and a separate band of light that resembled a mouth. On the top of the ball was a small antenna, likely for transmitting signals. All in all, it looked like a big, shiny, floating face.

Perry raised his eyebrows. _Oh. It actually is._

"_Would you like some refreshments, Miss Vanessa?_" it spoke in a cool, slightly robotic-sounding woman's voice, and it hummed over to the table to set the tray down carefully.

"Yes, thank you, ASA," Vanessa answered, taking her seat once more with a smile. The robot began handing out glasses of iced honey-colored liquid, probably sweet tea, and Vanessa and her father both took one. It then held one out to Perry, who gave the robot an analyzing stare before grasping the nearly-full cup cautiously and taking a sip. The condensation on the glass began to soak into his fur, and he set it down quickly- only to pick it up again and take another sip. It was good.

_So the floating ball can make tea, _he mused. _What a weird future this is._

"_Will that be all?_" ASA asked, in the same computer-generated voice. Vanessa nodded.

"Yeah, that's it," she replied. "Why don't you go do the dishes?"

The robot's eyes lit up once. "_Dishes; command received. Commencing activity._"

And with that, it began to float away into the kitchen, where the dishwasher opened by itself for the incoming robot. The mechanical arm extended once more and began to sort the clean dishes, taking extreme care not to break them.

Back at the coffee table, Doofenshmirtz had already taken a sip from his drink and appeared quite satisfied. Perry still looked rather bewildered.

"So, anyone feel like explaining this to me?" he questioned, folding his hands in his lap.

Vanessa was the first to answer. "Oh, that's ASA. It's an acronym for 'Automated Service Android'. I think of it as one of the only useful things he made," she indicated her father, who looked up from his drink and scowled lightly, seeming irritated.

"But it really is useful," she continued, a little more cheerfully. "It's like a robotic maid, it does all the housework. It can cook, and it controls all the electronics in the house with a wireless signal, and it can access the internet really quickly, too. The only downside is when it gets the idea to vacuum in the middle of the night."

"I made it just for my baby girl," Doofenshmirtz commented affectionately, leaning over to hug his daughter. "So she can live a life of leisure!"

Perry raised an eyebrow, impressed. "Hmm, an Inator that works…that's a new one."

"And don't you get any ideas about destroying it, either," Doofenshmirtz warned. "It only does the dishes anyway! And they're not even evil dishes!"

Perry rolled his eyes. "Oh, all right."

Doofenshmirtz smiled again, satisfied. "Good. And don't go looking for the self destruct button, either, 'cause it doesn't have one! Ooh, I'm so evil." And he loosed a small cackle, to which Perry responded with a glare.

"I miss the good old days when I could cause just about anything to explode," he muttered.

Vanessa rolled her eyes. "Hey, Dad, I have another question," she said. "Why haven't you tried to capture him or something?"

"Oh, that," Doofenshmirtz answered, launching into an explanation. "Well, the thing is, I'm planning to capture him after a while so I can bring him in to LOVE MUFFIN and regain my place on the supreme council thingy- along with my membership benefits."

Vanessa frowned. "But now he knows you plan to do it."

Doofenshmirtz paused as the realization hit him. "Oh. That wasn't so bright, I guess…"

Vanessa laughed quietly, but Perry frowned. "How can you take all this so lightly?"

Doofenshmirtz shrugged. "I don't know…"

Perry seemed absolutely bewildered. "Seriously, your house just exploded, we just free-fell a few hundred feet and got rescued by a robotic jet plane, and we're now being hunted by the very organization you used to work for. Why are you still smiling?"

The doctor seemed to search for an answer for a moment, and came up with nothing. "Um…I'm a cheerful guy?" he offered hopefully.

"You mean a cheerful moron," Perry muttered under his breath, shaking his head. Suddenly, he noticed Doofenshmirtz scowling at him and jumped. "Whoops, I keep forgetting this translator is turned on…"

"Hey, was that an insult?" Doofenshmirtz demanded.

"No, it's just another way of saying that you are happy, but not particularly bright. You said it yourself, after all."

"Hurtful!"

Vanessa smiled discreetly at the two of them as they bickered, and realized just how much her father must have missed their battles. Even these little disputes, she realized, must have been a daily part of his routine, even when Perry didn't talk, and it must have been crushing to live without such an ordinary thing for so long.

However, for her, it was only annoying. She cleared her throat, an irritated frown now spreading across her features. "Hey, would you two stop it?"

Doofenshmirtz froze in the middle of a nasty retort and looked at her with that wide eyed expression that meant he had only just remembered she was there. "Oh, okay."

Perry merely relaxed his features and turned to Vanessa instead. "So, aside from all that, how have you been doing these past years?" he asked politely.

Vanessa's mood lightened a bit. "Oh, I've been fine. While Dad was off taking over, I was in college, doing something useful with my life."

"Really?" Perry asked, intrigued. As far as he knew (and that wasn't very far), Vanessa had never shown any academic interest. "So what did you major in?"

"I got a PH.D in psychology," Vanessa answered proudly, straightening up a bit. Her thin-rimmed glasses gleamed in the artificial light from the ceiling lamp, accentuating her cool but smart appearance. Perry nodded, impressed.

"Wow," he said, interested. "So what made you decide to be a doctor?"

She merely glanced over at her father meaningfully. Perry nodded in comprehension, with a mischievous grin. "Oh, of course."

Beside her on the couch, Doofenshmirtz hadn't noticed a thing. "I know I've said this a million times, but I am so proud of you, honey!" he praised, swelling with pride in his daughter. "The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, I guess!"

Vanessa looked skyward in exasperation. "It can roll," she muttered.

Perry snickered quietly in a style very similar to his usual chatter, and Doofenshmirtz raised an eyebrow as the meaning of the remark began to sink in. Finally, he cleared his throat, trying to ignore his nemesis' mirth.

"Hey, Vanessa," he started, "you know how my building blew up?"

Vanessa nodded slowly. "Yeah."

"And how LOVE MUFFIN is kind of hunting me now?"

Vanessa narrowed her eyes. "Oh, this can't be good."

He grinned sheepishly. "So can we…?"

Vanessa huffed. "Fine, I'll have ASA set up the guest bedroom." And she stood to do just that, calling the robot over once more to discuss the matter and give orders.

Across the table, Perry raised an eyebrow, his laughter having subsided. "You're staying the night?"

"You can stay too," Vanessa called over. "If you go out, you'll get captured, remember?"

"Yeah, you're not going anywhere," Doofenshmirtz agreed, to his nemesis' slight surprise. "If you do, I'll never get to go back to LOVE MUFFIN!"

"Wow, thanks for the hospitality," Perry said sarcastically.

Doofenshmirtz just scowled. "I can't wait to eliminate you."

Perry rolled his eyes, wearing a trace of a smile, and muttered, "With a friend like you, I don't even need an enemy." All the same, he knew that he couldn't just wander on the street. Training under the OWCA had taught him many things, and one of them was to take no chances. But Doofenshmirtz was a different matter- Perry was mostly certain that he could handle whatever his nemesis threw at him.

Mostly.

_To be continued…_


	6. The ASAssin

**Author's Notes: **Decided to fix up Perry's fighting terminology in this one. Be honest, 'knifehand strike' is way more colorful than 'karate chop'! :P

Also, after rereading the fight scene, I decided to make everybody a little more rational and considerate towards ASA. After all, it was only acting on LOVE MUFFIN's orders and probably didn't have a choice, and I know some of you were a little upset when everybody was mean to it.

Well, that's all. Enjoy! ^^

* * *

><p>Later that evening, Perry found himself being treated to a dinner cooked by ASA, enjoying a pleasant conversation with Vanessa, and trying to ignore Doofenshmirtz throughout it all. His nemesis seemed to genuinely enjoy the experience, as if he had forgotten all about the events that had taken place earlier that day. But none of them were completely at ease- now and then the nemeses would shoot each other a glare that said, "I still hate you, by the way." Having arrived late in the evening anyway, the time seemed to fly before it was time to retire, and it wasn't long before ASA began clearing the table from dinner and Vanessa left to escort her father to the guest room.<p>

"Okay, Dad, you go get set up in there," she instructed, leaving him to his own devices soon afterward. "I'm going to go see about Perry the Platypus."

Back at the table, Perry was waiting patiently for her return, unsure of where he was expected to sleep. On any ordinary night, he would be curled up with Phineas or Ferb (and on some occasions, Candace), but of course this was not an ordinary night. So it was natural that when Vanessa returned, he was visibly lost.

"Well, Dad's all set up," she told him when she arrived once more in the kitchen. "All we need to do now is figure out where you're going to sleep." She thought for a moment, seeming unsure of it herself. "Hm, I guess I should have thought of that before I put Dad in the guest room. You _are _more of a guest."

Perry gained a bashful expression. "It's okay. I could just stay on the sofa or something."

"Are you sure?" she asked. "I'm sure he wouldn't mind sleeping out here."

Perry smiled inwardly, sure that he would. "Thanks, but that's alright. I think I'll survive."

Vanessa sat down on the other end of the couch with a thoughtful expression, seeming interested by Perry's use of the word. "Well, with LOVE MUFFIN all over, I hope you will. Now Dad's not even part of it anymore, so even he isn't of any help…" She sighed. "It seems kind of bleak, doesn't it?"

"It does?" Perry responded, slightly surprised. Then he caught himself, and quickly corrected the sentence. "Well, yeah, it does, but I just didn't think you'd see it that way. I mean, you've got a great life. You have a fancy degree, a nice apartment, lots of friends, and you can have whatever else you want because your dad works for LOVE MUFFIN- or at least he used to. Why does it seem bleak to you?"

Vanessa drummed her fingers lightly on her knee in a distracted way. "It seems great when you look at it that way. But material possessions are just for decoration. They don't give you a good life. Because Dad's part of that organization- formerly, anyway- my life is really easy. I just spend all my free time hanging out with my friends, doing whatever I want. But it's not really fun, because the whole time I know that my fun is at their expense." She paused and stared at the smooth-grained coffee table, glinting slightly in the light. "Even Dad isn't really enjoying his rule…"

Perry, who had begun to look rather regretful by now, raised an eyebrow. "Really? He seems so cheerful, even in this situation."

"That's because he doesn't want to face the facts," Vanessa told him. "After you disappeared, I came to visit. He was on top of the world, couldn't stop talking about how he got rid of you. Then he helped take over, and it seemed like he had it made."

Perry scowled. That sounded like something Doofenshmirtz would do.

"But after a while," Vanessa continued pensively, "something changed. He didn't brag about it so much, and he didn't seem so enthusiastic about his evil schemes. After a while, it seemed like he didn't feel like doing _anything_ evil. I wasn't in touch very often, but I get the feeling he thought something was missing. And now that it's back, he's too thrilled to be serious." Having finished her explanation, she directed her attention to Perry, just to see how he would react. "So it's an interesting little conundrum, isn't it?"

Perry seemed rather bemused. He looked back up at Vanessa questioningly. "Wait," he said, giving a short, chatter-like laugh. "Are you telling me that he actually missed me?"

Vanessa shrugged. "Seems pretty obvious to me. I mean, I am a psychiatrist."

Perry considered that for a moment. Well, he had certainly missed battling Doofenshmirtz when the man replaced him with Peter the Panda. Was it possible that the doctor could feel the same in such a position…?

But for the moment, he shook the thought away. Something else had just occurred to him, and he felt he had to ask about it. "Hey, Vanessa?"

"Hm?"

He thought for a moment, considering how to phrase the sentence. Sometimes, talking was so difficult. He didn't know how humans did it so much. "A while ago, Norm was playing the radio, and this song came on that said something about…rebels."

Vanessa nodded. "Oh, you mean the ones my dad's always getting in trouble with. Yeah, there's a rebellion around here. They're always leading attacks against LOVE MUFFIN, trying to take over various command buildings, you get the idea." She paused and gave him a peculiar glance. "I bet you want to join up, don't you?"

But Perry was already forming the next stage of his plan in his mind. First, he'd escape somehow, as he had planned to do before. Then he would seek out the rebels, using the Disguise-Inator to find information on them and reach their base, and join up as soon as possible. Surely they could use a secret agent among their ranks, especially one who knew just about everything about one of LOVE MUFFIN's leaders.

As he began to think of just how he would go about this, Vanessa smirked from beside him. "Well, good luck with that. For now, it's getting really late, so you should get some sleep." She stood up swiftly and slid a drawer out of the coffee table, then removed a fleece blanket from within and handed it to Perry.

"Here, you'll probably need this," she said. "Oh, and if you hear any weird noises in the night, it's either ASA making noise, or aliens." And she winked, smiling, and left for her own room, flicking off the light switch as she went. Perry smiled too, halfway because of the joke and halfway because he was now ready to make an escape attempt. Then he settled down on the black leather sofa, prepared to lay low for a while.

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, ASA was too busy to make noise at the moment. It was in the guest bedroom, hovering in front of Doofenshmirtz while it waited to receive orders.<p>

"Okay, ASA," the doctor began. "There's something I need you to do."

"_Yes, sir,_"ASA replied mechanically.

"I want you to keep an eye on Perry the Platypus, and make sure he doesn't escape," Doofenshmirtz told the machine sternly. "If I know him, he'll try to skip out on me, and I can't get back to LOVE MUFFIN unless I capture him, which I can't do if he escapes. Does that make sense?"

ASA's eyes flashed once. "_Vaguely, sir._"

Doofenshmirtz shrugged. "Good enough." Then, turning out the bedside lamp, he bid the robot goodnight.

As the doctor began to drift off, ASA floated out into the hallway. However, halfway down the short corridor, it stopped short and hovered silently. Its eyes lit up once more and flashed several times, bearing the words, _INCOMING TRANSMISSION._

It seemed Doofenshmirtz wasn't the only one who could give orders.

* * *

><p>Back in the living room, Perry had curled up in the corner of the sofa and spread the blanket over himself in a comfortable manner, appearing to be asleep. However, his eyes were open just a slit, focused intently on the hallway, where a light still shone- probably Vanessa's. No, he hadn't given up on escaping, nor found a reason not to. OWCA agents weren't easy to catch, no matter how strong your forces were, and Perry was the best of the best. He was sure he'd manage to escape from LOVE MUFFIN and find some way to bring them down, even if he had to do it alone. That was how he always operated- by going solo.<p>

Suddenly, the light in the hallway flickered and died, and the corridor was plunged into darkness. Perry perked up and stared at the hall for a moment, just to make sure the coast was clear. No one came, and there was total silence in the apartment, save for the sound of passing vehicles outside. It was the perfect time to make a sneaky getaway.

Perry slipped out of the blanket silently and took a step toward the edge of the sofa, which squeaked slightly. He froze, removed his foot, and instead leapt straight off to the carpet below, performing a dive roll as he hit it. This he accomplished soundlessly. Then he rose swiftly and snuck over to the front door, intent on sneaking out through the hallway. After that, he'd just have to wing it- the plan was rather rough and lacking in details, but he was sure of his objectives and was vaguely certain about how he wanted to achieve them, and he felt that that was enough for now. After all, he had rushed into a great deal of situations before with little or no planning beforehand, and he had come out of all of them mostly unscathed.

However, as he reached the door, there was a whooshing noise and he found the way blocked by ASA, whose metal form glinted in the shafts of moonlight from the windows. He narrowed his eyes and motioned for the robot to step aside.

"_Perry the Platypus,_" the machine said in its monotone automatic voice, "_I am afraid I cannot let you leave. Please return to bed and stay there._"

And without further ado, it promptly grabbed him by the scruff of the neck with a mechanical arm, ignoring his hushed protests and struggling. Then, floating back over to the sofa and dropping him in the corner, the robot proceeded to tuck him in roughly, give him a pat on the head, and at last float off to inspect the kitchen. Perry shot up into a sitting position as soon as it left and watched it go with an exasperated expression, until it disappeared through the shadowed doorway. A few moments passed in tense silence, while he listened intently.

Nothing came.

He slipped out of the blanket once more, determined to escape this time, and stepped off of the sofa discreetly. Perhaps he couldn't escape with the robot watching, but if he could pull it off unnoticed, he would probably have the whole night to get as far away as he could from Doofenshmirtz. And that sounded pretty good to him.

He crept silently across the carpet, just as he had done so many times back at Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated, staying out of the moonlight so as to remain unseen. The door grew closer and closer, tall and dark and slightly forbidding, and as he arrived at the threshold, Perry reached up and grasped the cold metal handle.

But as he began to turn it, there was an alarmingly loud _click_, and he found that the door had locked itself. He struggled with the knob for a moment, twisting it repeatedly with no result other than a frustrating half-turn. He growled under his breath, but the sound was suddenly punctured by a quiet whirring noise that made his heart stop. Slowly, he turned around to find the source of the noise.

There, floating in a sliver of a moonbeam and shadowed darkly except for its glowing eyes, which had changed from blue to red, was ASA. The robot seemed to have changed from an innocent housekeeping machine to something darker, more forbidding.

Perry cocked an eyebrow, then spoke in a hushed voice. "Open the front door, ASA."

The robot remained motionless. "_I'm sorry, Perry. I'm afraid I can't do that._"

For a moment, he remained still and stared into the scarlet LED eyes, evaluating the situation. Finally, he huffed angrily. Whether ASA liked it or not, no one could stop Perry from escaping- one way or another.

Suddenly and without warning, he dived underneath the floating metal ball and sprinted for the sofa, which he jumped on top of. The robot spun around with surprising speed as Perry jumped from the top of the sofa to a nearby shelf, and took a flying leap at the air conditioning vent from there. He stretched out a hand to try and grab the fixture, in order to pull himself up and get inside, but with a metallic scraping noise, one of ASA's mechanical arms shot out like a bullet and seized his ankle. Very suddenly, Perry found himself flipped upside down and dangling helplessly, slowly being lowered down to ASA's face height. Upon reaching that height, Perry swung his tail forcefully and hit the robot in the face, knocking it backwards and causing its grip on his foot to loosen. He slipped out of the iron grip easily and rolled backwards as he hit the floor, then stood and assumed a fighting pose on instinct. ASA responded by flashing its eyes once and suddenly releasing two more mechanical arms, one carrying a flyswatter and the other holding a fork. Perry gained an exasperated gape.

"Three arms?" he asked, bewildered. "Why in the world do you need _three_ arms?"

"_Multitasking,_" ASA replied simply. It then began to advance on him, brandishing the flyswatter threateningly. Perry's eyes widened in alarm, but he didn't have enough time to wonder why the robot seemed to want to attack him suddenly. One of the arms thrust the fork at him and he sidestepped quickly, returning the attack with a swift knifehand strike. The arm thudded lifelessly to the floor, but the assault was far from over- ASA responded by taking a swipe at him with the flyswatter and reaching for him with the other arm simultaneously.

Perry jumped the first swipe, then ducked as the mechanical arm whizzed over his head and bumped his fedora ever so slightly. He tilted his head upwards and pressed a button on the side of the hat, activating the chainsaw blade hidden within and effectively sawing off the end of the arm. The metal grasper fell with a dense _thump _to the floor, and Perry quickly grasped the severed and wildly sparking end to use for defense.

"ASA!" he hissed, still trying to keep his voice down so as not to wake up the Doofenshmirtzes. "Stop it, I don't want to fight you!"

ASA just retracted the arm and proceeded to advance with the other two, still wielding the makeshift weapons. Perry, deciding there was nothing for it, rushed at the robot and feigned a strike with the grasper, then slid underneath the robot and popped up on the other side, using the opportunity to thrust the weapon at ASA's turned back. However, the robot was apparently quicker than he had expected- it spun around faster than he could realize what was happening and seized his hand, flipping him into the air over its head and slamming him to the ground. Perry's head swam for a moment, before he realized something was missing from his hand. He looked up blurrily and saw that ASA had recovered its severed arm and appeared to be trying to reconnect it using one of the other graspers, whose flyswatter had been abandoned. To his great surprise, the stump of the mechanical arm sprouted new wires and connected them to the other piece, and the two smoothly merged into an undamaged arm, just as it had been before.

Perry gulped, stunned by this new development. _Well, at least Vanessa won't make me pay for damages to her robot._

He got to his feet quickly, wobbling slightly, and tried to get his balance. But ASA didn't appear to be very patient, as it suddenly rushed towards him with the fork outstretched like a lance. Perry performed a leaping dive roll and landed in the kitchen doorway, prepared to flee if the need arose. ASA turned on a dime and charged again, still brandishing the fork, and Perry avoided it by jumping onto one of the counters. This time, the robot went a little too far and accidentally impaled one of the wooden cabinets with the fork. Perry winced slightly. That cabinet looked expensive.

ASA pulled at the silver utensil for a moment, then gave up the attempt and rounded on Perry once more, temporarily weaponless except for its own mechanical limbs.

Still not keen on how Vanessa would react to his attacking her robot, Perry decided to try to reason with it again. "ASA, seriously!" he whispered, now a little concerned for its sanity. "Why are you doing this?"

"_I have orders to destroy you,_" it said, in a completely emotionless voice that showed no sign of regret. "_Hold still, small monotreme._"

Perry's eyes widened. Could Doofenshmirtz have…? No. He didn't have time to think about who caused this- only what to do about it. He tensed his muscles in preparation to spring away if the machine charged again, but it didn't move. Instead, its eyes flashed once, and there was a whirring noise, like a device powering up. Perry glanced around wildly, trying to find the source of the noise, and his gaze landed on the dishwasher, which sported a gleaming light that read _**ON**_. He gasped slightly as he recalled what Vanessa had said about ASA- "It can control all the electronics in the house with an wireless signal."

_Not good._

Just then, the dishwasher's door slammed open and the drawers within jerked out. They were conveniently filled with sharp-looking silverware that flew out from the force of the impact, a hurricane of cutlery headed straight for Perry. Without thinking, he leapt out of the way with an alarmed grimace and landed on the wooden floor right next to the dishwasher. Glancing around, he noticed several contents of the dishwasher that hadn't flown out and seized them hurriedly. A frantic moment later, he was wearing a strainer like a helmet, carrying a lightweight plate for a shield, and tightly grasping the handle of a tiny paring knife. Perhaps not the best defense, but defense nonetheless.

At that moment, ASA decided to launch another attack, this time in the form of seizing several knives, forks, and even spoons in its three mechanical arms and flinging them at Perry. Perry crouched defensively behind the plate, which the makeshift darts glanced off of with several earsplitting scraping noises. One of them knocked the shield clean out of his hand, and when he looked up once more, two of ASA's mechanical arms had reached for him instead and were too close to be evaded.

The claw-like graspers seized him around the middle and lifted him into the air, holding him overtop of another suddenly menacing machine as a loud whirring noise filled the room- the now-activated blender, whose metal blades spun dangerously. The strainer helmet flew off as he struggled frantically, landing in the nearby sink as if it needed washing. Perry grabbed one of the arms and pulled at its metal digits frantically in an attempt to sway their grip and escape, but to no avail.

Finally, as the plastic and rather large blender drew closer and closer, he raised the paring knife high and brought it down in a clean slice across both arms. The outer metal ripped under the ordinarily harmless blade and revealed the wires within, a few of which had been sliced as well. However, this wasn't entirely beneficial- the robot's grip promptly slackened and released him, and he fell straight towards the spinning blades below. But before he could fall and meet his certain doom, he extended his arms and legs and seized the rim of the machine, the same way he used to do when the boys tried to give him a bath, stopping his fall effectively. As the machine continued to whirr threateningly, Perry breathed a quick sigh of relief.

Meanwhile, ASA's mechanical arms appeared to have been rendered useless, as they were hanging limp in the air. However, the robot wasted no time in observing the damage; it merely retracted the arms into its body and prepared to attack once more, this time turning on the sink and picking up the removable nozzle in its remaining grasper.

As it did so, Perry managed to push himself out of the mouth of the blender, making sure to hold on to his hat tightly, and landed on the counter safely. Suddenly, a thought occurred to him- they had been making an awful lot of noise. Hadn't anyone noticed yet?

And then, as if on cue, Vanessa's voice echoed from down the hall. "Perry the Platypus? ASA? What are you doing out there?"

Perry perked up as ASA promptly aimed the nozzle at him and began to blast water at him. As he dodged the spray, he yelled, "Vanessa! It's ASA, it's trying to-"

But there came a sudden slamming noise from down the hall and a surprised shout from Vanessa, and Perry realized ASA must have shut her door and locked her in. As he paused, considering that, the stream of water from the sink hit his face and shocked him considerably- it was ice cold. As he wiped his mouth, he scowled at the robot.

"What was _that _supposed to do?" he demanded, irritated. Naturally, ASA didn't reply, but instead picked up one of the butter knives off of the floor with its remaining arm. The robot extended the knife in an almost fencer-like pose.

Perry quickly evaluated the situation, searching his memory for anything that could help him defeat the near-invincible robot. It was definitely a lot tougher than he had expected it to be, especially for a simple house-cleaning machine. Perhaps there was something to do with the way it controlled the house's electronics- if he could disable that and its last grasper, he could incapacitate it and figure out what had caused its sudden assault.

Suddenly, he noticed one detail on the robot's head, something Doofenshmirtz had obviously missed when planning the robot's design- a very large and obvious antenna. He smirked- somehow, he had just known the machine couldn't function perfectly.

Then, ready at last, he tightened his grip on the paring knife and rushed at the robot, forcing it backwards and out of the kitchen, into the hallway, and into the darkened laundry room beyond. The two of them fenced with the silverware for a few intense moments, the clanging of metal against metal filling the shadowed room. Finally, Perry saw an opening and leapt into the air, bringing one foot down on the robot's remaining arm and shattering it with sheer force. At the same time, he swung the paring knife in a deadly slice, cutting straight through the antenna on ASA's head with a sharp scraping noise.

The lifeless mechanical arm and severed antenna fell to the floor, clacking against it loudly, and ASA was at last rendered weaponless. Perry paused for a moment, breathing heavily, and waited to see what it would do. However, instead of surrendering as he had expected, the ball-shaped robot simply turned around and charged madly at him, obviously intent on destroying him no matter what. Perry evaded the attack easily by leaping straight over it and landing in front of the washing machine, desperately trying to think of some way to make it stop. At this rate, he'd simply have to destroy it if it wouldn't stand down…

And then, as the robot turned around to charge once more, a plan materialized in Perry's mind. ASA rushed at him again, with an almost furious gleam in its red glowing eyes, and Perry performed an incredible flip onto the top of the washing machine, opening the door as he went. ASA, damaged and befuddled, flew straight into the depths of the machine, and Perry slammed the door behind it. Then, just as the robot began to compute the imminent consequences of the trick Perry had played, the platypus turned on the machine. Water flooded into the metal chamber, drowning ASA in its dark interior, and there came a great deal of sparking and electrical sputtering from within. Finally, there was a tiny explosion, and the machine shut off of its own accord. Silence filled the room, along with a little smoke, and nothing moved, not even Perry.

Finally, he remembered to breathe. Air flooded back into his lungs, and he dropped to his hands and knees on top of the cold metal in exhaustion. It was over. At long last, the nerve wracking, heart-pounding fight was over.

As he panted heavily, he muttered to himself, "I should've taken the guest room."

Just then, a door banged open down the hall and there came the sound of running feet, and in a moment, Vanessa had arrived and turned on a light. She looked absolutely shocked and rather frightened, and it didn't help when she saw Perry collapsed on top of the washing machine. She gasped, stunned, and rushed over to the machine.

"Perry, what happened?" she exclaimed, unsure of what to do exactly.

Perry, having caught his breath somewhat, climbed into a sitting position and looked up at her. "Vanessa," he said carefully, "I think…your housemaid tried to kill me."

"What?" Vanessa sputtered, bewildered. Perry gestured at the washing machine and stepped onto the nearby dryer instead, allowing Vanessa to open the machine and have a look inside. The machine was filled with a sparking, soaking, and partially destroyed ASA, which appeared to be singing about daisies in a warped tone.

Vanessa looked back up at Perry, seeming a bit taken aback. "Did ASA really try to- did you put it in-? How did this happen?"

Feeling very uncomfortable and a little ashamed, Perry opened his mouth to explain; but just then, the sound of plodding footsteps filled the hallway once more, and Doofenshmirtz's tired voice called, "Hey, what's going on out here?"

A moment after this, he poked his head in through the doorway. "Perry the Platypus? What are you doing in here?" He then noticed Vanessa staring into the washing machine once more, and he cocked an eyebrow. "…Laundry?"

Perry caught sight of his nemesis, and a new wave of anger coursed through him. It made perfect sense to him now- Doofenshmirtz must have given ASA the orders to destroy Perry, rather than go to the trouble of capturing and eliminating the agent by himself. This was exactly the reason Perry had tried to escape in the first place, and he found it infuriating that the scheme had almost worked. Disregarding his post-fight exhaustion, he rose to his feet once more and jumped down from the machine.

"Doofenshmirtz! You know perfectly well that I'm not doing laundry!" he said angrily, glaring up at his enemy.

Doofenshmirtz didn't seem to get the point. "Well, yeah, I kinda figured that wasn't it. I mean, why would you be doing my daughter's laundry at this hour of the night for no apparent reason? It makes no sense."

Perry growled under his breath and face palmed. Then he looked back up at his nemesis once more, determined to give him a good scolding. "Don't try to fool me! You gave ASA orders to try and destroy me early, didn't you? Well, I'll have you know it was incredibly rude and out-of-character, sending a merciless machine after me instead of going through the usual deal of trapping and escaping and all that." He noticed the confused look on the doctor's face in the middle of the rant, and suddenly paused. "What? Why do you look so shocked?"

Doofenshmirtz looked absolutely bewildered, and a little frightened. "Because that's not true! I-I mean, you're right about me giving ASA orders, but I didn't tell it to _kill_ you! I just told it to make sure you didn't escape or anything."

Perry's thoughts came to a standstill. For a silent moment, absolutely nothing made sense- and then, suddenly, his mind was bursting with questions.

"But it said it had orders to destroy me!" he protested, convinced that his nemesis must have been behind the stunt. "How could it possibly want to destroy me if you didn't tell it to?"

"I don't know," Doofenshmirtz answered with a shrug. "I'm pretty sure Vanessa doesn't want to kill you, either."

Before Vanessa could respond and answer that she definitely didn't, Perry interrupted. "Wait, does that mean you actually _don't _want to kill me?"

Doofenshmirtz paused, thought for a moment, and then gained a stunned expression at what he had said. "N-no! Of course I want to destroy you…I'm, uh, just waiting for a good chance! Yeah, that's it." And he folded his arms and smirked in satisfaction.

Perry snorted. "Yeah, right. You just be glad I'm too tired to think up any snappy comebacks." But even as he finished the sentence, Vanessa's words from earlier in the night came back to him, and he had to wonder…

Just then, Vanessa rejoined the conversation. "Wait, wait. ASA said it had orders to destroy Perry. Dad, you said you didn't tell it to do that. I know I didn't, and the only other person who could've done it is Perry himself…so it probably wasn't any of us."

Perry nodded, and Doofenshmirtz placed a hand on his chin in thoughtful consideration. "Okay, go on."

"So if it wasn't us and no one else came into contact with ASA," Vanessa continued, "it must have received a wireless signal containing the order. Now, where would it have gotten that signal from?"

They all thought for a moment, before Perry's eyes widened and he snapped his fingers.

"LOVE MUFFIN," he muttered.

Vanessa nodded. "Dad built ASA, and he's part of LOVE MUFFIN, so they must have gotten to it somehow and tried to use it to destroy you. I can't believe none of us suspected them…"

"That does make sense," Perry agreed, feeling a little awkward about blaming Doofenshmirtz so vehemently. "But how did they find us?"

Vanessa shrugged. "I have no idea. I guess they really are everywhere…" And she looked around uncomfortably, as if she were afraid they might be watching at that very moment. The thought of LOVE MUFFIN knowing what went on in her own home was a very unsettling one.

Eventually, she looked back into the washing machine with a little sigh. "Well, anyway, what are we going to do with ASA?" she asked, staring in sadly at the slightly squashed robot, whose song wound down until it was too low and slow to be heard.

Behind her, Perry looked away awkwardly. "Um, right…I'm sorry about that."

Vanessa reached into the machine and lifted ASA out gently, bits of sheet metal dropping off as she held it gingerly. "It's okay…Dad could probably repair it. Couldn't you, Dad?" she said pointedly, turning to her father with a hopeful smile.

Doofenshmirtz sighed, looking tired. "Tomorrow," he promised, smiling wanly at his beloved daughter. Then he yawned unexpectedly, causing Perry to jump. "Now that we figured that out, can we go back to bed?" he asked in a sleepy voice, seemingly unfazed by the fact that his robot maid had just tried to destroy his nemesis. Perry seemed stunned.

"You actually think you can _sleep _after that?" he said, exasperated. "I'm gonna be awake all night, jumping at every little noise I hear!" However, he paused just then, and the words were punctuated by a loud yawn of his own. Doofenshmirtz snickered quietly.

"I'm going back to bed," he announced, striding out of the room. "Sweet dreams, Perry the Platypus!" And before he left, he poked his head in once more and added, "And by that, I mean nightmares."

Perry sighed, listening to the retreating footsteps. "I guess we should go back to bed, too."

Vanessa nodded. "Yeah, but I'm going to go check the windows and doors first, just to be sure nothing else gets in…" As she spoke, she turned to Perry with a slightly stern expression. "Or out."

Perry raised his eyebrows, then turned his gaze away in shame. "You knew?"

"I had my suspicions," she told him, kneeling down to his face height. "Look, I know you probably aren't too comfortable with this, considering the circumstances. But staying here is a lot better than running out on the street with no idea where you're going, even if my dad is here too. And I'm pretty sure he won't try anything. He's probably asleep by now."

As if on cue, a loud snore emanated from the direction of the guest room, and Vanessa smiled in a tired way. "See? I think you're safe."

Perry sighed, knowing she was right. "Thanks, Vanessa…and please don't take it personally that I tried to escape."

She waved it away with a smile. "No, it's okay. Now, I think we'd all better go back to sleep, don't you?"

Perry nodded, feeling slightly abashed. "Okay." And he let her lead him back to the sofa, where he crawled back under the blanket in the corner to sleep.

"Goodnight, Perry," Vanessa said as she began to leave the room. Then she turned around, seeming slightly confused. "And why do you have a paring knife?"

Perry glanced back down at the knife in his hand with a start, having forgotten it was there. He laughed shakily, and set the utensil down on the coffee table. "It's a long story…"

Vanessa smiled and shook her head, then turned out the lights and returned to her bedroom. Shivering slightly in the darkness, Perry pulled the blanket over his head and stared at the inside with a wide-eyed watchfulness.

It was going to be a long night…

_To be continued…_

* * *

><p>See, I think the whole ASA thing went over a lot nicer this time! ^^ Last time Vanessa threw it in the garbage disposal, and I have to admit, that did seem pretty cold. So yeah, this was probably a better course of action.<p>

Hope you enjoyed the chapter!


	7. Perry Makes a Plan

**2:03 AM**

Morning hadn't come yet, or even dawn, but the streets of Danville were far from quiet. Even at this hour, cars raced along the dark city streets, illuminated only by the warm yellow glow cast by street lamps and the various lights thrown out of nearby windows. Some people were still at work, on night shifts, but aside from them and the various commuters that traveled the roads, most of the citizens were slumbering peacefully in their various suburban homes and apartments.

Well, most of them, anyway.

In a high-rise apartment at the corner of fifth and broad, the lights were off, but not everyone was asleep. Curled up in the corner of the sofa with a blanket pulled over his head, Perry was still wide awake and jumping at every noise, eyes wide and alert even though the blanket effectively blocked his view of the outside world. He hadn't slept at all, or even rested in the vaguest sense, since his harrowing fight with ASA.

And it had been hours.

Underneath the soft fleece of the blanket, Perry's heart was still racing wildly, unable to calm down after the fight with the robot. Adrenaline coursed through his veins, pounding in his ears and refusing to cease. No matter how he tried to calm down, soothe himself, or even close his eyes, his mind simply would not give in to sleep, and it was getting desperate. He knew he needed to sleep in order to face the day when it came, but it just wasn't happening.

At last, his watch read **2:18**, and he decided enough was enough. Back at home, when he was young, he used to snuggle close to Phineas and Ferb whenever he got scared at night. Being the kind, sweet kids that they were, the boys would always try their best to comfort him and make him feel better. But Phineas and Ferb weren't kids anymore, not in this future. Perry didn't even know where they were. And even though he wasn't really scared so much as just too alert, tonight he really wished he was tucked under Ferb's arm, or sleeping on Phineas' inflatable raft bed.

He sighed. Something had to be done.

As he was thinking about this, a particularly loud crack sounded from near the front door, and that was the breaking point for Perry. He shot out from underneath the blanket like a bullet, raced into the hallway with a great pounding of paws, and suddenly stopped dead in his tracks outside the laundry room door. Glancing behind himself, he saw the blanket slowly flutter to rest on the leather sofa. He breathed a sigh of relief and scolded himself for being so jumpy, knowing full well that nothing was there. But now that he was up, he thought, he might as well take a stroll around the house to try and soothe his nerves.

The apartment was still and quiet, and as he walked along its halls, so was Perry. At night, all the rooms was shadowed heavily and only a few bits of moonlight managed to squeeze through the closed blinds. Perry tried to take deep breaths and calm down, although it wasn't working very well.

In passing the kitchen, he happened to glance in and see the drawer where Vanessa had stored ASA for the night. A sudden image flashed through his mind of the robot, half-destroyed and seeking vengeance, crawling out of the drawer with the one remaining grasper extended threateningly- but he shook his head to clear it out. Such an idea was ridiculous.

But, now that he thought about it, ASA couldn't really come back to attack him, could it…?

He paused outside a different room and considered this. No, the robot was a mess. Until Doofenshmirtz fixed it, there was just no way that it could possibly-

Just then, there sounded another noise from the room and he jumped back, then turned quickly to see what had caused it. He stared into the darkness of Doofenshmirtz's room, not seeing anything for a moment. Then the noise came again, and he realized what it was; Doofenshmirtz was snoring.

With a quick eye roll, Perry wandered into the room to see just what the doctor was doing. As he had expected, he was sound asleep, muttering something about a 'Tickle-Inator' in between his loud snores. Perry smiled slightly.

_Even in his sleep, he's still scheming, _he thought to himself. A Tickle-Inator didn't sound so threatening…but it did sound like the kind of 'evil activity' that Major Monogram would tell him to investigate. Feeling an odd sense of nostalgia, Perry smiled to himself and gave in to the notion. Why not?

He crept into the room stealthily and climbed onto the foot of the bed, giving the sleeping Doofenshmirtz a long, hard stare. If he really was planning anything evil in his sleep, he certainly wouldn't get away with it- but talking in his sleep, even Perry had to admit, would be a poor excuse for an evil scheme.

As he considered this, Doofenshmirtz's snoring began to even out into a kind of pattern. Without his conscious consent, a large yawn suddenly escaped Perry, and he felt his eyelids drop a bit. Doofenshmirtz's steady snoring continued loudly, and gradually, Perry's breathing began to slow to match it. Somehow, the situation reminded him faintly of sleeping next to Phineas and Ferb, which made him tired. His heartbeat wore down until it was at a normal speed, and the adrenaline he had felt not a moment or two ago was slowly replaced by a drowsy sense of peace.

A small voice in the back of his mind was telling him to wake up and leave, but with the adrenaline draining already, sleep was coming on fast. Before he knew what he was doing, his legs had collapsed beneath him and he was curled up on the end of the bed, eyes closed and breathing languid. It had only been a day since he had last felt so at ease, but it felt like a year…maybe it wouldn't be so bad to just nap here for a little while. He could leave in a minute or two and go back to the sofa, and Doofenshmirtz would never be the wiser…

And before long, sleep took over, and Perry was lost to the realm of dreams.

Morning dawned bright and early, and Doofenshmirtz woke up just about as early. Being woken up in the night by a murderous serving robot must have messed up his sleeping habits, he supposed, because the clock on the wall claimed it was five AM. The clock was probably right, too, because he really felt only half awake, and maybe not even that. For a moment, he simply stared tiredly at the ceiling and stretched a bit- and then his foot bumped into something on the end of the bed.

Something that just so happened to be Perry. (Not that he knew that.)

For a moment, he poked at the small, warm lump with his foot, wondering fuzzily what it was. It seemed to have been there for a while, because the blankets underneath were nice and warm. Perry chirped in his sleep and scratched his cheek with his foot, giving a small twitch. Doofenshmirtz tried to look down at him, but he couldn't see past the blankets, which had become bunched up in the night. He couldn't remember Vanessa ever having a pet…but what else could it be?

Well, whatever it was, he decided he was too tired to care very much, and it _was_ awfully early in the morning. After all, if he wanted to capture Perry the Platypus soon, he had to get some sleep.

He yawned and reached down to pat the furry creature. "Goodnight, strange, undetermined critter," he mumbled. And moments later, he was snoring again.

But no sooner had the first snore escaped him than Perry woke up with a strangely uneasy feeling. His fur felt slightly ruffled, and there was a large lump under the blankets directly in front of him. For a moment, he tried to remember why he felt so unsettled; and then he realized just what the lump in front of him was.

Leaping up, he stared wide-eyed at Doofenshmirtz, who of course was fast asleep by now, and then at the clock with a wince. A minute or two, he had said- it had been a few hours! He must have been really tired.

Now, on the other hand, he felt wide awake, so he decided it was long since time to leave. He glanced back at Doofenshmirtz, raising an eyebrow uneasily. No, he probably hadn't noticed anything…hopefully when the doctor woke up, he would continue to think of the visit as a dream and nothing more, and Perry would never have to face such an embarrassing situation again.

He leapt off the bed quietly and tiptoed out of the room with a careful step. Then he headed back down the hallway towards the living room, ready to go back to sleep on the sofa, but paused outside the kitchen doorway. To his surprise, a light was on and Vanessa was seated at the kitchen table. He raised an eyebrow.

"Vanessa?" he asked, the translated chatter sounding a little scratchy. He cleared his throat and continued. "What are you doing up so early?"

Vanessa had slight shadows under her eyes, as if she hadn't slept well, and she looked rather surprised to see him (especially coming from her father's room). "Oh, Perry," she said. Her voice sounded sort of hollow, and a little stunned. "Hey, do you mind explaining this?"

She gestured towards the rest of the kitchen, and Perry winced again. It was a disaster. Silverware and plates were tossed everywhere, ASA's fork was still embedded in one of the cabinets, the dishwasher was hanging open with the drawers thrown out, and several areas were still slightly wet from ASA's usage of the sink. Vanessa herself seemed to have gotten over the initial shock of finding her kitchen in such disarray, but she still didn't seem to have fully accepted it.

"What was this, some kind of silverware battle?" she asked, still staring at the mess.

"Yup," Perry confirmed, the guilty feelings from the previous night returning. "Um…sorry about that." And he began to gather some of the utensils to clear the floor.

Vanessa knelt down and pulled the fork out of one of the cabinets with a small sigh. "Well, I guess that explains the paring knife."

For a moment, neither one of them spoke as they cleared the floor and deposited various items in the dishwasher. ASA really had gone all out in its midnight strike.

"So, did you have a good night's sleep?" Perry asked as he lifted a dinner plate. Vanessa shrugged.

"Not after ASA," she answered, glancing over at him. "You?"

Perry sighed. "Ditto. I kept feeling like I was going to be attacked all night."

Vanessa nodded tiredly. "I guess it's to be expected." She turned to face him. "You know, I've been thinking; if LOVE MUFFIN found you that fast, there's no telling when they'll attack again. And frankly, my apartment isn't the safest of places."

"Yeah," Perry agreed tiredly. "I just wish I knew where to go from here. That's really the problem…"

The silence continued, unbroken for a moment. Then suddenly, something occurred to Perry. "Hey, Vanessa? Do you know if LOVE MUFFIN has some kind of records or anything?"

Vanessa thought for a moment, then nodded. "Yeah, I think so. Why?"

Perry smiled slightly, set down a stray fork, and took out his spy watch, activating the holographic screen and tapping a few keys. Within moments, he had accessed the internet. "I just wanted to research something. How do you get to the records?"

"You need a password," said Vanessa, seeming to get the idea. "I think I wrote it down somewhere. Hold on a minute, I'll be right back."

She stepped over the scattered silverware carefully and left for her room, returning a moment later with a small slip of paper. "Okay, unless they've terminated Dad's membership already, you can use this." And she handed Perry the paper.

Perry smiled. "Thanks." And with a quick glance at the paper, he found the LOVE MUFFIN website and hit the login button.

"You know, they might have deleted his account by now," Vanessa told him, gathering a few knives as she talked. "How do you know it'll still work?"

Suddenly, there was a beep from the watch and the screen switched to a dashboard that read, _Welcome, Doctor Doofenshmirtz_.

Perry smirked. "Oh, I've got a good feeling about it."

Without further ado, he quickly clicked on a link labeled 'Records', which took him to a page that contained a huge list of events, names, and locations in the Tri-State Area. He blinked, stunned by the immense amount of information, and then tapped a few options to filter the list. As he began to search through a long list of names, each of which had a small description of the person to whom they belonged, Vanessa raised an eyebrow.

"What are you looking for?" she asked.

But Perry suddenly stopped scrolling through the list and clicked on something; a link labeled 'Flynn-Fletcher Family'. The link led him to a page that contained a group picture of the family members, which appeared to be several years old. It depicted Phineas, Ferb, and Candace, all of whom looked a little older than Perry remembered and slightly melancholy- probably because the picture had been taken after LOVE MUFFIN took over. Upon seeing the image, Perry's expression shifted to something between relief, longing, and angst. He stared at the boys' faces wistfully, and then scrolled down the page, which looked something like this;

**FLYNN-FLETCHER FAMILY**

**MEMBERS:**

**LAWRENCE FLETCHER**

**DEPARTED FOR BRITAIN PRIOR TO TAKEOVER**

**RE-ENTRY DENIED**

**LINDA FLYNN**

**DEPARTED FOR BRITAIN PRIOR TO TAKEOVER**

**RE-ENTRY DENIED**

**CANDACE JOHNSON**

**SPOUSE: JEREMY JOHNSON**

**PHINEAS FLYNN**

**CURRENTLY MISSING**

**FERB FLETCHER**

**CURRENTLY MISSING**

**KNOWN FORMER HOST FAMILY FOR OWCA**

Perry gave a small gasp, thoroughly shocked at this. 'Re-entry denied'? What was that supposed to mean? And Candace was married? And Phineas and Ferb were…_missing?_ Not even LOVE MUFFIN knew where they were? How could all this have happened in what seemed so short a time?

_Actually, it was a pretty long time, _a small voice said in the back of his mind.

_Quiet, you, _he told it. _I'm in the middle of shock here._

While he stared at the page blankly, Vanessa had given up on cleaning for a moment and was reading the holographic text backwards, her eyes lingering on Ferb's picture.

"I know those boys," she said softly. Her eyes were locked on the image, but her mind was far away, lost in memories of a time when strange kids in homemade jet planes could take her on a trip around the world just for fun.

"Former host family…" she murmured. Then she looked past the green hologram at Perry, whose face was now masked by depression. "They're _your_ family, aren't they?"

Perry didn't look away from the page. Memories of the boys were swirling around in his mind now, and the word _missing _kept popping up in the midst of all of them. For a moment, Vanessa began to wonder whether he had heard at all; but then he spoke.

"If not for the Time Transporter-Inator," he began regretfully, "I'd be home with them now."

He let the silence stretch for a moment, then looked up at Vanessa with a stronger expression. His hat shadowed his eyes from the morning light, giving him a tough appearance, and he gained a very determined visage. "I have to find them."

Vanessa seemed a little confused. "But the file said they were missing, and that could mean anything. For all we know, LOVE MUFFIN captured them and took them away to have them build stuff for them or something. And if they really are missing, and not even LOVE MUFFIN knows where they are, then how are _you _going to find them? That organization has cameras everywhere, spies galore, you name it. But you- you're just one little platypus."

Perry shook his head and returned to picking up silverware with renewed vigor. "Thanks for the concern, Vanessa, but no matter the odds, I can't give up. They were more than a cover, and I _will _find them." The conviction in his voice was staggeringly real, and his eyes were full of steely blue resolve.

Vanessa was silent for a moment, then sighed. "I guess there's no stopping you. But what about the rebels? Don't you want to find them, too?"

"The rebels will have to take a backseat," Perry answered, scrolling down on the holographic screen as he spoke and dropping a spoon into the dishwasher. "Nothing is more important to me than those boys. And if anyone knows where they are…" he paused, having found a section of the page about Candace. "It'll be their sister."

It was around four hours later when Doofenshmirtz finally decided to get up. After the ASA incident, he had already had trouble sleeping, and then he had that strange and bewildering dream about some kind of cat or something on the foot of his bed, which only made things worse. So it was natural that by the time he came to breakfast, Perry and Vanessa were already up and deep in debate about something. He didn't hear most of the conversation, because they were talking in rather low voices, but he did catch small snitches of it here and there.

"So that's most of the plan…"

"But how will you get there?…"

"I don't know…need some kind of transport…"

Just then, he arrived in the kitchen, bleary-eyed and wearing his slightly-singed lab coat like a bathrobe over his pajamas. Perry looked up instantly, nodded to acknowledge his nemesis' presence, and turned back to Vanessa, who waved to her father.

"Good morning, Dad," she greeted him as he sat down at the table. "Did you sleep okay? Well, after ASA, that is."

He yawned. "Not really…I kept waking up in the night." Then he added, with a confused squint, "Hey, Vanessa, did you get a cat or something recently?"

Vanessa raised an eyebrow. Unnoticed across the table, Perry suddenly froze and began to pray fervently that they would let it slide. This was one conversation he _really _didn't want to have.

At length, Vanessa said slowly, "Um, no…why?"

Doofenshmirtz scratched his chin absently, considering that. Finally, he replied, "Oh…weird." And without further elaboration, he shrugged it off and changed the subject, with a little sigh of relief from Perry. "So what were you guys talking about?"

They were both silent for a moment, and Vanessa looked to Perry, as if waiting for his approval. "Can I tell him?"

Perry considered it for a moment, his face shadowed by his hat so you couldn't see what he was thinking. For a few seconds, it seemed like he might not answer at all- but suddenly, his face lit up, and he nodded.

"Yeah. I'll tell him," he said, with a faintly sly smile. Vanessa raised her other eyebrow, but she didn't argue, so Perry continued. "See, I have a few things to do and I happen to be out of transportation. And without the benefits from LOVE MUFFIN, Vanessa will need to keep her job, so she can't just take an indefinite amount of time off to drive me around, or she'll get fired." He smiled, placing the tips of his fingers together in an acute arch. "And that's where you come in."

Doofenshmirtz gained a wary expression. "If you're asking to borrow Norm again, forget it. The last time you did that, I couldn't find him for ages, and when I did, he was sunk in a river, covered in oil from a leak! It took _ages _to get him out, let alone repair him." He shuddered slightly. "That took a _long _time, let me tell you."

For the first time in the conversation, Perry gave an unexpected and rather embarrassed grin. "Yeah, about that…I was kind of in a hurry…" Then he cleared his throat. "Anyway. I'm sorry to say that that's exactly what I'm asking. But I probably won't bring him back in ruins this time…" And he added in a mumble, "if I bring him back at all…"

Doofenshmirtz just scowled stubbornly. "Are you serious?"

"Dead serious," Perry replied, and his expression clearly stated it was true.

They were both silent for a few seconds, while Doofenshmirtz thought it over. Then he crossed his arms and asked obstinately, "Well, what do _I_ get out of the deal?"

Perry froze up. He looked away quickly and lowered his hat so you couldn't see his face anymore, although a flash of a frown showed before he did so. Obviously, he hadn't actually thought of anything to bargain with. Doofenshmirtz snorted.

"Okay, I'll think of something for you," he said, realizing that he had a small advantage. "How about…you tell me what you need him for first?"

Perry didn't bother to look back up. He merely called out from underneath the brim of the fedora, "Fine. You can tell him now, Vanessa."

Vanessa smiled, raising an eyebrow. She didn't know exactly what Perry was thinking, but she decided that if he thought it was safe, it was probably safe. She turned back to Doofenshmirtz, who was looking rather confused now, and cleared her throat.

"See, Dad, Perry and I were talking earlier about where he plans to go next," she began, trying to phrase the explanation in a manner that wouldn't instantly set him on his guard. "After all, he can't just stay here forever. LOVE MUFFIN already found him once and tried to destroy him; who's to say they won't do it again?"

Doofenshmirtz rolled his eyes. "I wish they would."

"Dad, you're forgetting something," continued Vanessa, ignoring the fiery glare that Perry was now giving his nemesis. "It's _way _past sundown- and Perry tells me that because of that, LOVE MUFFIN will consider you his accomplice so long as you keep following him. It might be better to just let him go."

That seemed to stun him slightly. "Oh…you're right…" For a moment, he considered that. It meant that unless he wanted to go home and give up on his membership benefits, he _had _to capture Perry and bring him in at some point- before LOVE MUFFIN captured them both. He gulped. It wouldn't be easy, but then, the other options weren't, either.

"Okay, point taken, we probably shouldn't stay here," he conceded. "So, what _do _we do?"

"We?" Perry asked, looking up with one eye narrowed. "No one said anything about both of us going."

"But what about my plan?" Doofenshmirtz whined.

"Your plan is exactly why I can't let you come!" said Perry in exasperation.

Vanessa rolled her eyes. "Seriously, you guys." Then, turning her gaze to Perry, she asked, "Are we going to tell him or not?"

Perry thought about it for a moment. At length, he said pensively, "If we tell you, will you try to understand that it's nothing you need to come along for?"

Doofenshmirtz shrugged. "Sure. Whatever."

Frustrated and tired of arguing, Perry conceded. "Fine. Vanessa, do you want to explain?"

"Why don't you, while I go get some breakfast for us all?" Vanessa proposed, hoping to get away from the two of them. They were positively volatile sometimes.

Perry thought for a second, then nodded. Finally. Vanessa smiled, got up from the table, and made her way to the cabinets, which she began to search through for some kind of breakfast food.

Perry adjusted himself in the chair and looked up to face Doofenshmirtz. He began to explain in a very serious, businesslike tone. "The thing is, I want to try to find some…friends of mine, who could hide me, until I figured out what to do. But it turns out those friends are actually missing, so in order to find them, I'll have to locate someone close to them and get information on where they might be. That's why I need Norm; I plan to go visit this someone. After that, I'll hopefully have a lead on their whereabouts, so I plan to find them and send Norm back to you. Simple, right?"

Doofenshmirtz nodded slowly. "Well, yeah…but you _do _realize that I know your whole plan now, right?"

Perry smiled in a distinctly sly manner. "Ah, but do you?"

Doofenshmirtz opened his mouth to reply, but Perry held up a hand. "It's rhetorical." And he closed it quickly.

Then Perry continued. "Nonetheless, I haven't told you any specific details at all, unlike you and your evil schemes. In fact, even if you were to contact LOVE MUFFIN and spill the beans somehow, they still wouldn't know where I was going, because neither of you know any details. Not much of a lead, huh?"

Doofenshmirtz scowled at his nemesis, who now had a rather satisfied smile. As much as he hated to admit it, Perry was right- now that he thought about it, he knew virtually nothing about the plan, except for a very rough outline that could mean anything. For all he knew, Perry wasn't even telling the truth. But what put him off most was that it didn't seem to include anything about him, and in order to follow through with his _own _plan, he had to keep traveling with Perry (and capture him eventually).

He continued in an irritated voice. "Okay, so I don't really know the plan. Whatever. But if I do lend you Norm, then where do I fit in? I could just drive for you, y'know. You're kinda…" he struggled for a good word for a moment. "…short." Which was an understatement.

Perry shook his head firmly. "No, I need to do this alone. Stop traveling with me, and they probably won't care what you do. Ordinarily, I wouldn't be asking this, but it's either that or walking, and I'm _not _doing that."

Then he fixed his nemesis with a piercing gaze and asked, "So, what'll it be?"

Doofenshmirtz didn't answer, and Perry didn't speak again. For a moment, the two of them stared at each other, stony-faced and stubborn, neither one wanting to give in or give up. The silence stretched across the kitchen, until even Vanessa seemed to feel rather uncomfortable. Finally, Doofenshmirtz looked away pointedly.

"Let me think about it," he muttered resentfully.

Perry frowned, annoyed. "Can you think about it quickly? I kind of need to get going."

"Not before breakfast, you don't," Vanessa spoke up unexpectedly from beside the cabinets. "If I could only _find_ breakfast…usually ASA does all the cooking."

Finally, she huffed and closed the cabinet door, turning to the phone on the wall. "I'll just order out. Call Bob's Breakfast Buffet."

The phone emitted a ringing noise and proclaimed in a mechanical voice, "Voice print detected. Calling 'Bob's Breakfast Buffet'."

At the table, Perry gave the phone an appraising glance. "Nice technology."

"I know, right?" Doofenshmirtz said cheerfully, forgetting his previous concerns. "You have to admit, it's a pretty cool world these days. Vanessa's phone is really advanced."

"Can it transport people to Easter Island?" Perry asked jokingly.

Doofenshmirtz raised an eyebrow. "Well, why would anyone want to do _that?_"

Perry thought for a moment, came up empty-handed, and then shrugged. "Actually, I don't know. I never thought to ask."

Just then, the phone ceased ringing and a young man's voice answered it. "Hello, this is Bob's Breakfast Buffet. How can I help you?"

Vanessa cleared her throat. "Hi, I'd like to place a take-out order for the three-course special on speedy delivery. Put it on my account."

"Name, please?"

"Vanessa Doofenshmirtz. I'm sure you recognize it…"

"Doofenshmirtz?" the man responded questioningly. On the other end, someone could be heard giggling at the name. The attendant cleared his throat and continued, "Um…scan, please…"

Vanessa cocked an eyebrow and said, "Okay just a moment." And she leaned in to the phone, where a small camera-like device let out a green light and scanned her iris quickly, then stood back to observe. There was a moment of silence while the man on the other end presumably looked over the results.

Finally, he responded with a slightly awkward tone. "Sorry, miss, but it seems your account has been terminated. Would you still like to order the three-course special?"

Vanessa seemed rather taken aback. "Terminated?"

"Um, yes…" said the attendant over the phone. "So, about the take-out…?"

Vanessa was quiet for a few seconds, then responded uncomfortably, "Uh, no. Never mind." And she hung up by pressing a button on the phone. She sighed heavily. "I'll just get out the cereal…"

While she did that, Perry glanced at Doofenshmirtz once more and said, "You know, even if I just leave and walk off alone, what are you going to do?" He tilted his head quizzically. "Sit around hoping I do something stupid and get caught?"

When Doofenshmirtz did not reply for a while, he sighed and muttered under his breath, "I hope you know what you're doing."

About thirty minutes later, everyone had [somewhat] enjoyed a lovely breakfast of cereal, cereal, and more cereal. After clearing the dishes, Vanessa departed to make a call to work and explain her absence, and Perry and Doofenshmirtz were left alone.

Perry eyed his nemesis analytically. "So, have you decided yet?"

Doofenshmirtz didn't answer. Instead, he stared out the window blankly, still refusing to make eye contact. For a few moments, Perry tried to be patient, just in case he gave an answer, but eventually he'd had enough. Rather frustrated by now, he hopped out of the chair and left for the living room, wishing he'd gotten a less stubborn nemesis. As soon as he was gone, Doofenshmirtz sighed quietly and placed a hand on his temple. Vanessa, who had just finished her phone call, hung up and sat down at the table across from him.

"What's eating you?" she asked curiously, studying his face.

He shrugged, seeming slightly downhearted. "I just thought…y'know, that bringing Perry the Platypus back would mean that we could go back to our regular routine…and then we got into this mess." At this, his shoulders slumped a bit. "And now he seems like he just wants to leave, which does make sense, but still…"

Vanessa cocked her head. "I thought you _wanted_ to get rid of him."

Doofenshmirtz was quiet for a moment. He glanced around as if to see whether anyone was listening in, then turned his attention back to her. "Okay, here it is. But you can't tell anyone," he said in a very quiet voice. "I like to _try _to destroy him…but if it actually happened, what kind of an evil scientist would I be?" He paused for a moment before answering his own question. "A _lame_ one- without a nemesis! I mean, everybody else was happy to get rid of theirs, which made them look all big and tough, so that's good for them. But I just…" he trailed off uncomfortably, glancing at the living room. Then he turned his attention back to Vanessa. "The point is, I actually _enjoy_ hating him, and I wish we could just get back to fighting each other."

Despite his concerned frown, Vanessa almost felt like smiling. _I knew it, _she thought to herself. But on the outside, she donned a sympathetic expression and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Dad, I know it'll be hard for you, but Perry has other, more important things to do right now. These friends he's looking for are very important to him, and he's already told me that he won't stop looking for them for anything-!"

Suddenly, Doofenshmirtz perked up. People that were important to Perry? To anyone else, it would simply be rather interesting, but to him, it sounded like the perfect opportunity to find his nemesis' ultimate weakness, which he had always wanted to do. And that gave him another idea, which was just unfurling itself in his mind before-

"Dad, what's up?"

Her voice seemed to snap him out of his thoughts, and he answered just a little too quickly. "Nothing! I was just, um…considering the decision. Yeah! That's what I was doing." At this, he grinned, with an almost malicious tint to it. "And I think I've come to a conclusion."

Perry was just putting his spy watch away when Doofenshmirtz ventured into the living room, wearing a satisfied half-smile that he was obviously trying (and failing) to conceal. "Okay, Perry the Platypus," he said, "I've made my decision."

Perry looked up from the watch screen with interest. "And?" he prompted.

Doofenshmirtz answered quickly. "You can borrow Norm."

Perry raised an eyebrow suspiciously. There seemed to be something fishy about his nemesis, almost as if he had a plan of his own and wasn't telling. If so, he was doing a bad job of hiding it. But, an offer was an offer.

"You're absolutely serious?" he said, not fully believing it.

Doofenshmirtz nodded, unable to keep from smirking slightly. "Yup, I'm serious. You can take him _wherever _you like. Anywhere at all. Don't even bother sending him back."

Perry frowned slightly. He was sure his nemesis was up to something, but he really did need to get searching for the boys, and all the same, he got a ride out of it.

Finally, he got up and nodded sharply. "Deal."

"Great!" Doofenshmirtz exclaimed, somehow managing to remain relatively calm on the outside. "Just great…"

Perry still seemed slightly put off, but he didn't do anything about it. Doofenshmirtz grinned.

All according to plan.

_To be continued…_


	8. A Family Matter

**Author's Notes:** Didn't make a whole lot of changes in this one. Oh well, can't help it if there just isn't much that needs fixing, right?

Anyway, enjoy~ ^^

* * *

><p>Perry took only a few minutes to prepare for his trip that day, being mostly ready in the first place. He hardly needed to pack anything, except for some food and water that Vanessa offered him, and aside from that, he only needed his hat and the Disguise-Inator. Soon, he was ready to leave and get started on his new mission.<p>

Vanessa was the first to see him off at the apartment door. She wasted no time in kneeling down to give him a goodbye hug, which Perry was slightly surprised to receive, but accepted nonetheless.

"You be careful, okay?" she told him as she released him from the embrace.

Perry nodded, a confident smile resting on his lips. "I will."

"Don't go getting caught or anything," she reminded him, to which he responded with a second nod. "And keep your disguise on whenever you can. For once, I think Dad's right; LOVE MUFFIN really is everywhere…"

The both of them glanced around uncomfortably at that, wondering if the organization already knew of Perry's next move and could possibly be tracking Norm somehow. After a few seconds of silence, Perry decided to ask a question.

"Hey, speaking of that, I was just wondering something," he said, brows coming together in concern. "If LOVE MUFFIN found me here, then they must know you were helping me. That means they might go after you, too. Will you be okay here with your dad?"

Vanessa exhaled in a slightly worried manner. "Well, if they do come after me, I won't tell them anything. As for you, just do whatever you have to do." Perry still seemed worried, but she added in a whisper, "Don't worry about me. Go find your family."

Perry gave a feeble smile. "Okay."

Vanessa stood up once more, smiling now, and glanced around. "That's funny, I thought Dad would want to say goodbye too…I wonder where he is."

Perry frowned suspiciously. "Weird. I figured he'd try to wish me bad luck or something."

"That sounds like something he'd do…" Vanessa agreed hesitantly. "But, you know, he could just be off sulking somewhere because he let you take his car. Or getting out his tools to fix ASA. You never know with Dad."

Perry shrugged, frowning suspiciously. Well, at least the last statement was true. You never did know.

"You'd better ask him to put some kind of safety restraints on that thing," he said, with a little smile. Vanessa laughed, but she quickly agreed in earnest.

However, a quick glance at his watch told him that it was nearing eleven o' clock, and he wanted to be on his way by noon at the latest. So he decided not to worry about what schemes his nemesis might be plotting; for the moment.

He made a small chirp to get Vanessa's wayward attention, and tipped his hat to her. "Thanks so much for your hospitality, Vanessa. I'm really sorry about your robot, and…" he paused briefly, taking notice of the flyswatter ASA had attempted to use as a weapon, which was now dangling from the ceiling fan. "…and stuff…"

Vanessa waved it away with a smile. "No, no, it's ok. You did help clean up, after all, and I'll survive until Dad can fix ASA." (She didn't seem to notice the flyswatter.) "In fact, now that I think about it, the thing was probably spying on me for ages, so it might be a good thing that it showed its true colors."

"You're sure?" Perry asked, still slightly concerned and more than a little guilty. Vanessa continued to smile encouragingly. Somewhere behind the smile, she was probably worried- but she didn't let on in front of him.

"I'm sure," she answered. "Now, you'd better get going."

Perry nodded, then tapped the green button on the side of the Disguise-Inator. "Default Three."

Around him, the hologram fizzed to life, creating the image of the lank-haired teenage boy far over his head and hiding his own small form. He flexed his fingers to test it, and the boy's image emulated the motion exactly. Vanessa raised her eyebrows.

"Wow," she commented. "Dad really did a good job on this thing, didn't he?"

"His inventing skills seem to have improved since my time," Perry answered, the teenage boy's mouth matching the words instead of appearing to chatter like the real Perry. "It would be sort of alarming- if I wasn't already sure that his intellect is still the same."

Vanessa giggled quietly, glancing behind her as if afraid that her father might hear. Then Perry opened the door behind him and took a step backwards into the hallway, still facing the apartment and its owner.

"Thanks again, Vanessa," he said, by way of a goodbye. "If all goes well, maybe we'll meet again- and hopefully not with one of us in a jail cell."

Vanessa grinned. "Hopefully."

A small, nearly undetectable smile appeared on the hologram's face. Then he reached up to tip a hat that she couldn't see, and departed down the hallway.

Vanessa watched him walk away, until he reached the elevator and disappeared behind the doors. "Good luck…"

* * *

><p>A few minutes later, Perry had reached the bottom of the building without detection, and was prepared to get started on his trip. As he exited the large glass doors of the tall apartment building, he tightened his grip on the car keys resting in his pocket; Norm's keys, trap-free and everything. The robot-turned-truck was parked outside the building in exactly the same place he had been before, his smiling robotic face still on the hood like an ornament (no one seemed to notice).<p>

As Perry approached, he wondered why Doofenshmirtz had seemed so content to lend the robot to his nemesis. The other time Perry had borrowed Norm, it was very late at night and the doctor had been tired, so he could understand that. But when he had asked to borrow the robot this time, he was really expecting Doofenshmirtz to say no. Of course, the consequences for this particular scenario would likely have involved him stealing it instead, so he had certainly been hoping for a yes. He just hadn't expected Doofenshmirtz to give in so easily- the mad scientist usually liked to act all annoyed and crotchety about things like this, unless he had changed drastically during Perry's eight years of absence. Considering that that scenario was unlikely, Perry felt he had good reason to suspect something was up. But until that something revealed itself, he really only had time to think about getting on the road.

He stepped up to Norm's driver side and opened the door by pushing a button on the car keys, to which Norm responded with a cheery greeting. "Hello, Perry the Platypus!"

"Shh," Perry scolded, raising a finger to his lips (er, bill). "New rule- no using my name anymore. Okay?"

"Okay," said Norm pleasantly. "Where is Doctor D?"

Perry stepped inside quickly and shut the door, afraid of any further comments that might give him away. Once he was fairly sure he was safe, he decided to explain. "Doofenshmirtz has agreed to let me borrow you so I can run a few…errands." Which was pretty much true. "He won't be coming along."

"Why not?" Norm asked.

Perry chose not to answer directly, just in case Norm could somehow contact his human master and convey everything Perry had said. "I'm not doing anything important. He doesn't need to come." And with that, he moved on to a new topic, refusing to elaborate. "Okay, before we leave, I need you to cut off all internet or GPS connections. I can't afford to be detected."

"Sure thing," Norm complied cheerfully, and there was a small beep. "All done!"

"Great, let's go," Perry replied, pulling the keys out of his pocket. He took a brief look at them, then slipped them into the keyhole and turned on the car; a strange thing to do, as Norm himself was already awake, but necessary to activate the manual controls. The dashboard, he noticed, seemed more advanced than a regular car. Aside from the steering wheel, gas meter, and speedometer, there were two buttons that read '_AUTOPILOT_' and '_MANUAL OVERRIDE'_, what looked like another eye scanner, and a touch screen accessible from both the driver's and passenger's seats. The touch screen had several buttons that read, '_RADIO_', '_MUSIC_', and '_MOVIES_'.

Perry took a moment to examine each of the options, then finally glanced down at the gas pedal and brake. At least those hadn't changed much, although he still couldn't reach them on his own. Luckily, he had remembered to pack one of his most valuable devices- a pair of stilts of adjustable length with foot-straps at the top, whose purpose was to allow him to reach the gas pedal and brake on any standard vehicle. They had allowed him to take control of many a car and had never failed him- though they did tend to get rather sweaty after a while.

Ignoring that slightly disconcerting fact, Perry took out the stilts from who knows where and managed to slip them on (of course the hologram's appearance didn't change at all). He then grasped the steering wheel, positioned one foot over the accelerator, and did his best to recall the directions he'd found to Candace's apartment.

_Time to go._

* * *

><p>It was around twenty minutes later when Perry arrived at his destination- a tall, brick-walled apartment building that seemed slightly older than the structures around it. The large red and white sign on the wall read "FOR LEASE", but it seemed rather weathered and old, much like the building itself. You had to wonder just how long the place had been for lease in the first place.<p>

The parking lot around the back had a dilapidated metal link fence surrounding it, which was partially covered in tall grass in some parts, and the sun-bleached asphalt looked like it was overdue for replacement. All in all, it seemed that Candace wasn't quite living her dream life, even if she had married Jeremy like she always fantasized about.

When Perry drove into the lot to find a parking space, the car bumped and jerked on the uneven road, causing the hologram to fizz slightly and even disappear once. Even though the parking lot was mostly empty except for a few cars, Perry was rather concerned about this, but on the contrary, Norm didn't seem fazed at all- he just made comments now and then like, "Whoops-a-daisy! Watch out for that pothole!" or "Careful, we wouldn't want to get a flat tire!"

Soon, Perry had found a good parking space in the corner of the lot, where he felt Norm wouldn't attract much attention (when one was driving a robotic truck with a giant grinning face on the hood, one had to be careful). He drove into the space and parked neatly in the shadow of the building, then stopped the car and removed the keys, which he replaced in his pocket. Then he reached up to touch the still-activated Disguise-Inator lightly. Time to switch disguises again.

Back at Vanessa's apartment, before he left, Perry had been thinking about what he planned to do if Doofenshmirtz actually did decide to lend him Norm. He had soon thought of a snag in his plan- Candace would surely be freaked out to see him again after eight years, especially if he was suddenly standing upright and speaking clear English. And after ASA, he felt it would be too risky to take the Disguise-Inator off much anymore. So, the only option left was to keep the device on, but that wouldn't quite work either. You couldn't just walk into a stranger's apartment and question them about their relatives for no reason, or you'd seem suspicious and probably wouldn't get any information at all. But if he could only disguise himself as someone close to Candace, then she might answer his questions; and it clicked.

And so he had accessed the LOVE MUFFIN records once more, this time searching for Stacy Hirano, Candace's best friend since grade school. Apparently, Stacy was still living in Danville, working a job at a local restaurant while she studied at the local university. Using a picture from the file, Perry had managed to create a custom disguise that looked like her, and since it was the weekend, she wouldn't have classes, so it was the perfect opportunity for Perry to fake a visit from her to Candace's house.

He cleared his throat once, ready to activate the disguise. "Custom disguise; Stacy."

Around him, there was a loud buzzing noise that lasted for a moment or so and then died down. Perry stood up in the seat, in order to look into the rear view mirror at himself, and instead saw the almond-shaped eyes of Stacy Hirano, framed by the same dark hair he knew from her frequent visits. Also reflected in the mirror was a blue satin headband and a pair of dangly purple earrings, and had the mirror been taller, he would have been able to see the slender form of the girl, wearing a neatly zipped-up purple jacket over a light teal shirt. The hologram also sported a blue skirt, a pair of clean pale blue socks, and over those, a pair of shiny black penny loafers. Stacy had certainly changed in the past eight years.

He smiled in satisfaction, which the hologram mirrored, and then began to unbuckle his seat belt. As he was doing this, there came a small noise from the backseat- a suppressed chuckle of sorts. Perry paused, seatbelt halfway undone, and stared suspiciously into the back of the car with narrow eyes. He watched the empty seats intently for a moment, during which everything was still.

Nothing moved.

Finally, after he allowed the silence to endure for a few moments more, he decided that the noise had simply been his imagination, so it was time to move on. He reached up to press the purple button on the Disguise-Inator, switching its function back to the translator.

"Custom voice: Stacy," he commanded, voice switching immediately to a much higher one. Having finished this, he cleared his throat and instructed, "Norm, stay here and try not to attract attention. I'm going in."

"Good luck!" said Norm, as if Perry was entering some kind of enemy base. Perry dismissed the comment without a response and swung the car door open, then hopped out onto the uneven asphalt. Without a word, he shut the door, locked the car with the keys, and strode off to the entrance to the building, black hair flowing out behind the hologram. Within a minute, he had disappeared around the corner, and Norm was left in the largely empty parking lot, alone.

Or so it seemed.

A moment or so passed before anything happened, but after a few seconds, Norm spoke once more. "You can come out now, sir."

Part of the back seat suddenly shimmered brightly, and the area which had appeared to be a seat suddenly vanished. Very abruptly, the hologram that had imitated the car so well disappeared, and it became clear that the robot really was not alone.

"Good work, Norm," said Doctor Doofenshmirtz with a sinister grin, obviously pleased with his scheme. "He almost found out, but I'm still safe."

"Nice disguise," said Norm, turning the head on the hood of the car around to smile at his creator.

Doofenshmirtz grinned and tapped a second Disguise-Inator perched on his ear. "I know, right? It's a good thing I had another one of these lying around, and it has that invisibility function. Vanessa's probably wondering where I went…hope she doesn't mind me forgetting to fix ASA."

He frowned for a moment, clearly not looking forward to Vanessa's reaction when she discovered he was missing. Then, trying not to think about that, he remarked, "By the way, Norm, great acting. I never knew you could lie like that!"

"I was pretty good, wasn't I?" Norm replied happily, flashing a few lights on the dashboard of the car to show his pleasure. Doofenshmirtz nodded and patted one of the seats.

"Oh, yeah," he praised. "Perry the Platypus never saw it coming!" Then he paused and snickered to himself quietly. "Speaking of Perry the Platypus, what's with that disguise? I mean, really, you have to wonder what he needs it for."

"Shouldn't you sneak in after him and find out, so we can tell LOVE MUFFIN?" Norm prompted.

Doofenshmirtz didn't seem fazed by this. "Ah, Norm," he drawled, "that's what you think. See, my objective in following Perry the Platypus is not to figure out where he's going and tell the board. It's to keep following him, and then capture him at some point. If I get LOVE MUFFIN in on it, they might not trust me, or let me help. But if I bring him in myself, then I'll gain their trust again, and I'll get my membership benefits back!" He grinned, clearly pleased with his own logic and not thinking about how he actually planned to do this. "It's genius!"

"Impressive, sir," Norm commented, playing a clapping sound over the speakers. "So what should we do for the moment?"

Doofenshmirtz thought for a second, then shrugged. "I don't know. I'm not going in after Perry the Platypus, I know that…I guess we just wait here."

"Okay, then, sir," said Norm cheerfully. And with that, the doctor settled into the back seat, prepared to wait while Perry ran his errand.

Whatever it was…

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, Perry was striding down a red, rough-carpeted hallway that led to Candace's apartment, glancing at the signs on each door in search of one that said 'Johnson'. So far, he wasn't having any luck, but his instincts said he was getting close. And after years of work as a field agent, Perry had learned to trust his instincts.<p>

Although the hologram around him appeared to be wearing shoes, Perry could feel the worn and slightly gritty-feeling carpet underneath his bare feet. It looked like it hadn't been cleaned in a while, and could use a good vacuuming. The clearest thing about the place was that it was old, in stark contrast to Vanessa's deluxe, high-rise apartment.

At last, he had nearly reached the end of the hall and hadn't found the right door, and he was beginning to wonder if Candace wasn't living on the roof. But then, he noticed the second-to-last door's sign- JOHNSON. He smiled to himself, halfway because his search was over and halfway because Jeremy wasn't the only one who answered to that name now. He hoped Stacy wasn't already at the apartment. _That _would certainly be awkward. Then, crossing his fingers with a preparatory breath, he reached up to the door and knocked sharply.

In the moment of silence before Candace's familiar voice called out from inside, "Hold on, I'm coming!", Perry wondered briefly what an older Candace would look like. Would she have changed dramatically? Would he even recognize her? The muffled sound of feet on carpet reached his ears, which stopped for a moment while she peered out of the peephole. Then there was a clicking noise as the door was unlocked, and it swung open swiftly.

The first thing he noticed was that her shoes seemed to be exactly the same as the ones she wore as a teenager- Perry would know, having spent so much time at foot level, pretending to be a mindless pet. But her socks were a much more mature color of magenta. Gone were the white miniskirt and red tank top of her youth, replaced by a cream colored miniskirt and a coral pink tank top. A sudden homesickness washed over Perry as he observed how little Candace had changed over the years, and he began to feel very nostalgic.

Upon seeing the Stacy hologram, her dark blue eyes lit up and she grinned. "Stace!" she exclaimed, spreading her arms to embrace her longtime friend. "It's great to see you!"

As she reached out to the hologram, Perry stepped backwards quickly, sensing danger if Candace tried to hug a girl who wasn't really there. "Great to see you too, Candace," he answered, a nervous inflection in his voice. Pretending not to notice the girl's slightly confused glance, he spoke up quickly to change the topic. "Uh, how have you been?"

Candace was quiet for a moment, still wearing a slightly put off expression, but then she seemed to brush it off. "I've been great," she replied, perky as ever. "And Jeremy's fine, too. So how are you? Classes going well and all?"

"Um," answered Perry, trying desperately to remember just what kind of classes Stacy was taking. "Yeah, they're going great. I'm definitely learning…stuff."

"That's great!" Candace said, smiling brightly now. "Come in, we can talk in here…"

And she opened the door and led him inside the apartment, which was very neat and tidy. Immediately to the left of the door was a small coat rack upon which two jackets hung, and to the right was a door that probably led to the washroom. Up ahead was the living room, where the sofa was positioned underneath the window in a ray of sunlight. In front of it was a small coffee table, and to the left, the carpet changed abruptly to linoleum to harbor a small kitchen. Seated at the kitchen table was Jeremy, looking more mature than Perry remembered and a little worn. He wore a brown jacket over a white shirt, and his blonde hair was a bit messy. Upon seeing Candace and the disguised Perry, he broke into a smile and put down the newspaper he was holding.

"Oh, hi, Stacy," he greeted cheerily, waving in their direction. Perry smiled and waved back, hoping he didn't seem suspicious. Then Candace led him to the sofa and they both sat down.

"So, what should we talk about?" Candace asked eagerly, obviously happy to see her friend. "How about you tell me what sort of things you've been learning at the university? Oh! Or I could tell you about Jeremy's new job!"

"Job _offer_," Jeremy corrected gently from the kitchen table, looking up from his newspaper. "I haven't actually taken it yet."

"Oh, right," giggled Candace, putting a hand over her mouth shyly. She turned back to Perry and began to explain, without asking for his consent. Well, Stacy had always had to listen to Candace's various ramblings anyway. It might be a little boring, but at least he would be in character.

"Well, you know what a good musician Jeremy is," said Candace, flashing a smile at her husband, who returned it happily. "And you know the government doesn't like music because it makes people too happy, but Jeremy says that to keep the populace from rebelling, they've decided to have a concert every month or so. So…they offered Jeremy a job as the lead guitarist and singer in their special band!"

She seemed very happy about this. But at the table, Perry noticed that Jeremy's expression had a tiny, nearly undetectable note of disapproval, as if he didn't exactly share Candace's sentiments. Perry could see why- working with the tyrannical LOVE MUFFIN council would make him look very bad, and it had to be against his morals.

As he observed this, Candace continued happily. "The pay's good, too. It would be a real step up from his job at Mr. Slushy Burger."

_So Candace is only thinking about the money, _thought Perry, almost smiling in spite of himself. _Some things never change._

Meanwhile, Candace's expression became slightly gloomier and she spoke again. "Although I'll miss working with him…" She sighed slightly, and Perry realized that she must have gotten a job at Mr. Slushy Burger alongside her husband. No wonder they were living in such a run-down place- two jobs at a fast food restaurant couldn't pay much.

Meanwhile, Candace seemed to have recovered from her brief funk and was now wearing a stronger expression. "Oh, well. Sacrifices have to be made."

"Yeah, I guess," Perry commented passively. He wondered if those sacrifices included working for the very organization which had enslaved them all in the first place.

Candace was quiet for a moment, which was unusual, but she looked back up quickly, ready to chat some more. "Oh, Stacy, did you see the news today?"

Perry blinked, and shook his head. "No, I was out before it came on," he said, which was true. He hadn't even considered staying at Vanessa's long enough to see the news.

"Well, it was interesting," said Candace, launching into an explanation before you could say 'gossip'. "They had this story about how one of the government officials went rogue, and he's supposed to be working with one of LM's worst enemies. Crazy, huh? Now they're both on the run, and the government says we citizens should report them if we see them anywhere." She paused and shook her head. "It's a crazy world out there, Stace."

As he listened, Perry had to restrain a tiny smile as he visualized what Candace would say if she knew she was talking to the very agent who had just made headlines. "Wow, that's pretty wild."

"You know what's even wilder?" said Candace, leaning forward a little. She didn't even give her friend time to respond, which didn't surprise Perry. "They say this 'worst enemy' of theirs is some kind of secret agent platypus!"

At this, she burst out in giggles, and Perry had to force himself to laugh along with her. For the life of him, he just couldn't understand why humans found it so odd for a secret agent to be an animal. It was rather belittling, come to think of it, to be thought of as mindless by the general population. But it did make a very good cover.

By the time Candace's giggles had died down, Perry was beginning to wonder how long he would have to wait to ask about the boys. Surely it would sound strange to switch immediately from one topic to a completely unrelated one, but he had to get his answers somehow.

Suddenly, an idea came to him, and he cleared his throat to speak. "Wow, a secret agent platypus. Weird!"

"I know, who thought _that _up?" Candace laughed, obviously finding the very thought ridiculous.

"Kind of reminds me of your pet platypus, remember him?"

Candace's last giggles died abruptly. Her smile shifted instantly to a rather sad expression, and she was quiet for a moment before responding. "Oh…Perry, yeah…"

He frowned, realizing that Candace probably wouldn't want to talk about what had happened to him, forget her own brothers' disappearance. Very suddenly, just about everyone in her family had all vanished just a few years apart from each other, and knowing Candace, she probably blamed herself in some way. But if he was ever going to find the boys, Perry knew he had to ask. And the only way to get to the boys was to lead up to it.

He gulped and continued. "Didn't something happen to him? Remind me again…"

"He disappeared, about eight years ago," said Candace regretfully. "The boys searched _everywhere _for him. They tried everything. But they never found him…" She clenched her fists and furrowed her brow, seeming frustrated. "I think it was my fault…I was always yelling at him to get out of my room and go take a bath and whatnot…maybe he finally had enough and ran away."

Perry's face felt a bit hot. He clenched his fists in an attempt to maintain control and looked away from the dark blue eyes that reminded him so much of Phineas and Ferb's. Candace thought he had run away just because of her… He had caused them so much grief…

He swallowed hard and forced himself to speak once more. "Th-that's terrible, Candace…Phineas and Ferb must have been crushed."

"They were devastated," Candace stated plainly, the words sounding rather blank. "And then there was the takeover, and they just…" She stopped here, and Perry didn't need to ask. That would have been the last year Candace saw her brothers, the year they vanished. She probably thought they were dead. He wanted to reach out and comfort her, tell who he was and that his disappearance wasn't her fault, give her a hug and tell her it was okay. Suddenly, he couldn't stand lying to her anymore, not for much longer. He'd have to cut to the chase before it started to cut at him.

"Candace," he started, in a more serious voice, "the boys used to tell you everything…don't you know anything about where they went?"

Jeremy looked up from his newspaper again, wearing a concerned expression that warned against asking such a thing. Candace thought for a moment, eyes locked on the slightly beat-up sofa cushions. For a moment, Perry thought she might not respond at all. But after a moment or two, she looked back up and said, "The last time I saw them was at Mom's house. Phineas told me he and Ferb were going somewhere, but he wouldn't say where. He just told me that if I ever wanted to visit…to just drop by the backyard." She paused and shook her head sadly. "I've never known Phineas to lie to anyone, but you can bet they were never in the backyard. Even after Mom and Dad moved out, I tried to go back, but no boys."

As she spoke, Perry's expression turned pensive. He placed a hand on his chin thoughtfully, trying to work it out in his head. He, too, had never known Phineas and Ferb to lie…

As he thought about this, Candace sighed and said, "Sometimes I wonder if there wasn't some kind of ulterior meaning…"

Perry's eyes widened slightly. Well, that made sense. Phineas and Ferb would never lie outright for no reason…unless they were trying to communicate something that couldn't be said outright in public. Perry himself had done this many times (being incapable of human speech prior to the Translator-Inator), so he knew perfectly well that the boys may have done just that. Now the only question was why, and he was intent on finding out.

But first, he couldn't just distress Candace and leave without a word.

"Hey." Candace looked up, eyes shining ever so slightly now. Perry offered a comforting smile. "This isn't your fault, Candace," he told her sincerely. "If Perry really did run away, which I'm sure he didn't, it wouldn't be because of you. And somewhere, somehow, Phineas and Ferb are okay. I just know it."

Candace smiled back, but there was a note of doubt in her face that said, 'Thanks, but you're nuts.' "Thanks, Stacy," she said gratefully. "You always know just what to say."

They were both quiet for a moment, as Perry tried to think of something else to say. But then, he happened to glance behind her at the clock on the wall and noticed that it was getting late in the afternoon; and if he wanted to find the boys as fast as possible, it was probably best to get going before the day was out. He stood abruptly, saying, "Oh, is that the time? I'm sorry, Candace, I should really be going…"

"Oh," said Candace softly, probably feeling confused as to why her friend was leaving so soon. "Well, okay then…" She stood up quickly and led him to the door, unlocking it so he could step outside.

"Bye, Stacy," she said sadly, giving a halfhearted wave.

Perry tried not to prolong the goodbyes, despite feeling guilty for leaving so unexpectedly. "Bye, Candace. Bye, Jeremy," he answered, trying to convey a little hope through the words.

"See ya, Stace," Jeremy called, walking out to join Candace in the doorway.

Then Perry waved goodbye to the couple and started off down the hallway, looking back only once. He reached the stairs and began his descent, the sound of flat, bare feet replacing what should have been the tapping of shoes.

_I will find you, boys,_ Perry told himself as he dashed down the steps, feeling gloomy after the talk with Candace. _Wherever you are, I know you're okay._

Back in the doorway, Jeremy looked down at Candace with a comforting smile and put his arm around her. "Are you okay?"

Candace sniffed. "Yeah, I'm just…feeling a little nostalgic…" She closed her eyes and let out a shaky sigh. "I'm okay…"

There was silence for a moment before Jeremy pulled his wife into a hug, which she returned in full. "Come on, let's go inside…" he murmured soothingly, leading her back inside toward the sofa.

"Phineas and Ferb…" Candace uttered, taking a gasping breath in between her words. "I'm sorry…about everything…I just wish you were here…"

And behind them, the door swung closed, undisturbed, as if nothing had happened at all.

_To be continued…_


	9. There Goes the Radio

**Author's Notes: **Waaaahhh, this chapter was so much fun to read through and edit again! :D I really enjoyed it!

I also got to add in some lighter bickering between Perry and Doof at the end, which was fun to write. ^w^ Gosh, I love those two.

/edit

So now we get some action! Woohoo! After, what, two chapters with none, it doesn't surprise me that chapter nine will be packed with the stuff, being twice the length of a normal chapter. I'm very pleased with this one, especially since my esteemed editor is pleased with it (and by editor, I mean my mom ^^). So I hope you guys will like it, too!

Also, I decided to add music this time! I don't know if you guys have ever read a fic like that, but here's how it works- I'll bring up a prompt in bold, telling you what to search on Youtube. Then you click on whatever comes up, assuming my search prompt still works, so you can listen to some music while you read! I didn't come up with the idea, but it's cool, huh? :)

The music I chose isn't just theme music, though- it has lyrics and stuff. I actually had three songs that I listened to while writing, to set the mood, but I think I'm only going to include two of them. I hope you enjoy both them and the chapter! :)

* * *

><p>It was afternoon by the time Perry left Candace's apartment, and by then he was feeling rather gloomy. After their conversation about the boys, he couldn't help but get himself lost in memories of those sweet summer days with Phineas and Ferb, when there was always some huge machine in the yard and some kind of yelling coming from their sister's room. Those days when Candace would jabber on about Jeremy on the phone while Perry snuck onto the couch without her consent, when he would trail the boys until it was time for his daily mission, and when he came home every day to a welcoming hug from one of them, laughing and eager to tell him all about their day. Though Perry hadn't had to live through eight years without it, he felt as if it had already been ages since the last time he heard that welcoming phrase…<p>

"_Oh, there you are, Perry!"_

Phineas' innocent voice echoed in his mind, calling from who knew where. Maybe, Perry thought, if he hadn't gone to work that summer day, this awful future might not exist, and Phineas and Ferb still would be under the tree when he came home, safe and sound.

He stared fixedly at his feet as these thoughts swirled around in his head, walking in a trance as he headed back to the car. He wasn't really focusing on anything, not even the gravelly sidewalk that poked at his bare feet or the heat from the sun, which had finally come out. He reached the dilapidated chain-link fence and stepped into the parking lot, then strode up to Norm, who was parked exactly where Perry had left him.

The robot's head turned to face him as he approached, still grinning. "Hello again!" Then he seemed to take notice of the dark and pensive frown reflected on Stacy's holographic face. "Did your errand go well?"

As he reached the door, Perry shrugged halfheartedly. "In a way. I know where to go next, at least…"

When he trailed off and didn't continue, Norm spoke up. "Is something wrong?"

Perry reached up to the door handle. "No, I'm just…" He sighed softly as Norm opened the door for him, then climbed into the front seat. "It's nothing."

"Okay," Norm said, as Perry reached up to grab his seat belt. "How was your friend?"

"She seems okay, but it was kind of nostalgic to-" suddenly, he froze, realizing something was out of place. Donning a suspicious frown, he fixed Norm with a piercing glare. "Wait. I never told you I was visiting a friend."

Norm was quiet for a moment. His expression, of course, did not change at all, but Perry could sense a sudden tension in the air. He raised an eyebrow and pressed further. "If I had you cut off all wireless communications, and I didn't tell you about the visit, then who _did?_"

"Certainly not Doctor D," Norm answered casually, perhaps a little too casually. Perry's eyes widened and then narrowed sharply, as the last puzzle piece clicked in his mind. That explained why Doofenshmirtz had been so eager to lend him Norm, and why he thought he had heard something in the backseat. It was a good thing Norm wasn't the brightest bulb in the box.

He clenched his fists in anger and turned in the seat, allowing the safety belt to retract into its original position. Then he stared into the supposedly empty back of the car, as if he could reveal the truth just by staring at it.

"Give it up, Doof," he called into the back. "You're busted."

When he was greeted by an all-too-quiet silence, he narrowed his eyes even further and added, "Don't make me come back there!"

Another tense moment of silence.

Then, just when Perry was considering climbing into the backseat like he'd threatened, there was a defeated sigh. "Oh, all right." Off came the disguise, the air in the backseat dissolving into static as the hologram disappeared. There was Doofenshmirtz, sitting in the backseat with an irritated frown, as he had probably been for hours. The hologram Stacy's eyebrows dropped dangerously, and underneath the hologram, Perry's fur bristled angrily. Doofenshmirtz gulped, feeling a bit nervous now.

Oh, that wasn't good.

"I can't _believe _you!" Perry exclaimed, feeling exasperated. "The one time I thought we had an actual deal, and you go and double-cross me anyway! This doesn't even concern you!"

Doofenshmirtz cringed a little, not used to having Perry berate him in such a way (or at all, for that matter). The translated girl's voice had hardly been raised, but there was something about it that clearly stated that Doofenshmirtz's actions were more than irritating. And more than that, there was an underlying note in it that suggested stress.

"This mission was already going to be tricky, and I hope you know that you just made it harder," Perry fumed in a very annoyed tone. "But I guess that's what nemeses do, huh? Make each other's lives difficult."

Doofenshmirtz grinned, still a little fearful of his nemesis' wrath, but feeling a little lighter all the same. "Well, of course that's what we do! You used to make my life difficult all the time, remember?"

"This is serious, Doof!" Perry snapped back, the flippant nickname rather contradicting his statement. Then he paused for a moment, gained a more thoughtful visage, and answered the question anyway. "Yes, of course I remember. I guess it was eight years ago for you, but for me, it was only- what, a day ago?" He snorted, still irritated nonetheless. "But really, why do you _always _have to go and make things difficult? This is a private matter!"

Doofenshmirtz perked up immediately. That seemed like an excellent opportunity to poke into Perry's private life and find his greatest weakness. "A private matter?" he asked curiously. "Like 'family' private? What are you, married with kids?" But as soon as the words left his mouth, he gasped and exclaimed, "Do you mean to tell me that I've been trying to destroy you all these years and you have _children _at home?"

Perry groaned and face palmed. "No, of course not. Don't jump to conclusions-"

"Oh, well, you could still be married for all I know! I mean, picture what would happen if I ever did destroy you! That would make me look like a _monster, _and I can't even _think _about your poor wife, at home all alone, waiting for you to come back even though she'll never see you again-!" Suddenly, he paused, as if a new thought had just occurred to him. "Wait, do platypuses even _get _married?"

"Doof, seriously!" Perry protested, interrupting the mad scientist mid-rant. "You're jumping to conclusions again! I'm not married, okay? Platypuses don't work like that."

"Well, that makes sense, I guess," Doofenshmirtz conceded with a shrug. "I mean, 'cause I was thinking, 'why would he take this dangerous job as a secret agent if he had loved ones at home?' And I couldn't come up with an answer, so it didn't make sense…"

As he spoke, Perry's eyes widened in a sudden realization- Doofenshmirtz was actually right. He had always known his job was dangerous, but in a way, that was why he had liked it- the thrill of conquering a supposedly insurmountable threat, the pride of knowing Danville was safe because of him (and of course, the simple pleasure of thwarting Doofenshmirtz's goofy schemes). But he'd never really considered how this affected his family, who would surely be crushed if he didn't come back from a mission one day.

Which, come to think of it, was exactly what had happened.

A few seconds passed while Doofenshmirtz continued to ramble in the backseat and Perry began to feel very ashamed of himself. As this was going on, both of them failed to notice a pair of men walking across the street toward the parking lot. The men wore crisp black suits and shoes, with matching sunglasses, and pinned to their jackets were the trademark LOVE MUFFIN buttons that silently proclaimed who they were- some of the organization's minions, headed back to their patrol car after lunch.

"Man, those subs were good, weren't they, Joe?" the shorter one remarked casually, wearing a rather crooked smile. The other nodded, mirroring the smile.

"Yup," he replied placidly. "They were pretty gr- oh, for the love o' cupcakes, what is that racket?"

The racket in question, of course, was the one that the nemeses were making, as Doofenshmirtz was taking no precautions of keeping his voice down, and Norm had now gotten in on the conversation that was beginning to resume once more. He and his companion looked around for a moment, and then the man pointed to a blue car parked in a corner of the lot. "Look, there. Looks like some kind of argument."

The other minion guffawed quietly to himself. "Heh, I love seeing unrest amongst the citizens."

"Hang on," said Joe, holding out a hand to stop his companion. "Does that one look familiar to you?"

The first man's giggles dissipated, and he squinted through his sunglasses into the back of the car. "What, the girl? Nope, never seen her. But she's kinda cute-!"

"Not her!" the second man scolded, shoving his companion and pointing to the back of the car. "That one there. You see him?"

"Yeah," the other minion mumbled. "What about 'im?"

"He looks familiar, I tell you! Think, Dean!" He seized his companion's shoulders and shook him forcefully.

"I c-can't think when you're r-r-rattling my brain like that!" Dean stuttered.

Meanwhile in the car, Perry was getting fed up with his nemesis. Doofenshmirtz had continued to ramble on about a completely unrelated subject for longer than Perry had the patience for (which was a long time), and with the additional pressures from having to find the missing Phineas and Ferb, attempting to avoid the tyrannical government, and feeling like he had let everyone down, the usually very patient secret agent had just about had it. And that was never good.

"DOOFENSHMIRTZ!" he yelled angrily, his voice carrying through the parking lot. "Shut _up!_ You're stressing me out!"

Outside the car, the minions' eyes widened in alarm. Then Joe grabbed his companion's shoulder once more and hissed, "Did you hear that, Dean? We found the traitor! The boss'd love it if we could capture him!"

Dean nodded fervently. "Yeah! We'll probably get longer breaks than anyone else, and maybe free doughnuts and-!"

"Okay, okay, point taken," Joe cut him off, smirking. He beckoned once to Dean and began to sneak away. "Let's get our hijack on."

Dean gulped, suddenly nervous. "Um, actually, I think I might've left mine at home."

His friend did not reply, merely groaning quietly. He tugged on Dean's arm once, and they both began to sneak up on the car to take the nemeses by surprise.

In the car, Doofenshmirtz was slightly confused by Perry's sudden outburst. He froze in the middle of comparing apples with oranges and stared at his nemesis, who really did seem to have had enough. Despite himself, the mad scientist could sort of see why- everyone had a breaking point, and having to listen to carefree rambling for a good five minutes after what must have been an upsetting visit with the 'old friend' Perry had spoken of was clearly enough to make the secret agent reach his. All Doofenshmirtz wanted to know was why. He was sure if he dared to ask, Perry wouldn't like it; but the curiosity was just too much.

"Perry the Platypus," he started cautiously, examining the holographic mask that hid his nemesis from view. "Are you okay?"

Perry's eyes darted away to stare at the floor instead, and he then turned away to sit properly in the front seat. "It's none of your business."

Doofenshmirtz frowned. Yes, something was definitely up; but it was clear that he wouldn't be able to get it out of Perry without a struggle. Rather than press the topic, which was probably futile, he decided to give it up and ask about something else.

"…Now what?"

In the front seat, Perry blinked. He hadn't considered that at all- not yet, anyway. Now that Doofenshmirtz mentioned it, he did have to decide what to do next, and it wouldn't be easy. His original plan had been to head straight to the Flynn-Fletcher House and try to search for the boys there, but with his nemesis tagging along (which he would probably manage to do whether Perry let him or not), he couldn't very well do that.

While Perry thought that over, Norm unexpectedly spoke up again. "Excuse me, sir," he piped, interrupting both of their thoughts. "It seems we have visitors!"

Doofenshmirtz blinked, confused. "Visitors…?"

But Perry got the message. His eyes widened, and he glanced up at the rear view mirror to have a look at the back of the car, where, sure enough, they did seem to have visitors.

Unwanted visitors.

"Oh, no," he muttered to himself, feeling a sense of urgency take over him as he reached for the seat belt. "Doof, we're leaving. Get your seat belt, quick."

"What?" Doofenshmirtz asked, clueless as usual. "Wait, does that mean I'm allowed to come?"

"If you don't want to get captured," Perry warned, slipping the keys into the ignition as fast as he could. "Seat belt, Doof! Move it!"

It was only then that Doofenshmirtz thought to look in the rear view mirror and gasped slightly. He too hurried to put the belt on, as Perry slipped on his stilts and grasped the steering wheel tightly. "Get us out of here, Norm!"

"Will do!" Norm replied cheerfully, and with that, Perry slammed on the accelerator and sped out of the parking space, zipping around the minions, who had by then nearly reached the car door. The men yelped and jumped out of the way, and Perry quickly maneuvered Norm out of the parking lot, intent on escaping as fast as possible.

Back in the lot, Joe was the first to recover. Gritting his teeth angrily, he growled, "So it's a chase you want, eh? Then it's a chase you'll get!"

And he quickly dragged Dean out to their own sleek black car, with the LOVE MUFFIN logo emblazoned on the side. The two of them leapt inside, Joe taking the wheel, and their car took off after Norm as fast as it could.

**(Time for some intense chase-scene music! ^^ Go look up 'Soul Eater - Resonance - [Creditless] HQ')**

A short ways ahead on the busy city road, Perry sped down the asphalt without a glance back, zipping around street corners and racing through the city as fast as Norm could go. He tried to keep to the outskirts of the city, knowing that if he didn't, traffic would detain them and more LOVE MUFFIN units would probably come. However, these outskirts often consisted of many winding roads and sharp turns that passed through old neighborhoods, which made navigating at high speeds somewhat difficult. Thankfully, Norm seemed to know exactly when to turn every time- literally.

Once he had reached a clear stretch of road, Perry checked the rear view mirror once again to see whether they were still being followed. To his dismay, the sleek black LOVE MUFFIN patrol car was still on their tail, and it would clearly be hard to shake off.

Perry groaned quietly. "I can't believe this!" he grumbled. Then, pointing behind him in Doofenshmirtz's general direction, he said angrily, "This is still your fault!"

Doofenshmirtz gasped, offended. "_My _fault?" he exclaimed in dismay, placing a hand on his chest in an exaggerated manner. "How do you figure that?"

"If you hadn't followed me, I wouldn't have yelled at you, and the minions wouldn't have noticed us, and we wouldn't be barreling down this street with no idea where we're going!" Perry rattled off without a breath. "Not to mention we've got a patrol team on our tail, who are likely to call for assistance any minute!"

Doofenshmirtz shrunk back into the seat, a little embarrassed. "Well-!" he began to protest, but it seemed he couldn't think of anything to protest with.

Despite the situation, a slight smirk spread across Perry's face, mirrored on Stacy's holographic one. "Ha. Gotcha there, huh?"

Doofenshmirtz seemed rather irritated now. "Norm, back me up here!" he pleaded. "He's using my own quote against me!"

Norm might actually have helped him then, if not for a sudden interruption in the form of a loud explosion from the rear of the vehicle that shook the car around considerably. Doofenshmirtz shrieked as the car rocked back and forth, and Perry struggled to maintain control of the steering wheel. Finally, he managed to take control of the car and they kept driving steadily, albeit with a trail of black smoke spreading out behind them.

"Whoops!" Norm chimed in, his mechanical voice cutting through the confusion. "That was a doozy!"

Perry took a moment to catch his breath, then asked, "Norm, is anything damaged?"

"Systems are mostly online," Norm replied cheerfully. "However, autopilot has been disabled. Looks like you'll have to keep driving!"

Perry sighed, relieved that nothing too horrible had happened. At least Norm hadn't started leaking oil again. "What the heck _was _that?" he exclaimed, taking a quick glance at the rear view mirror to see what had hit them. What he saw made his eyes widen; one of the minions pursuing them had produced a large gun- probably a stunning ray- from the car, and was pointing it out the window, aiming to fire at Norm again. Apparently, they had gotten impatient and decided to ramp up their capture attempts a bit.

"Oh, yeah, baby!" Dean yelled, holding the stun gun out the window of his LOVE MUFFIN car while Joe drove. "Getting out the _big _guns!" And he fired it once more in a random direction, just for fun, earning himself some scorching remarks from his partner.

Wondering about the explosion himself, Doofenshmirtz turned in his seat and glanced out the back window, then gasped slightly. "Not good, not good!" he shouted in a panicked voice, waving his arms around wildly to signify just how 'not good' the situation was. "Can't we go any faster?"

"If I do, I'm likely to lose control," Perry answered through gritted teeth and a determined scowl. "All I know is that we have to ditch them somehow. Any ideas?"

"Um," Doofenshmirtz paused, stunned at suddenly being asked his opinion. He shrugged nervously and responded, "Well, there was this one time back in Gimmelschtump where I got chased by this really huge catfish- and not in the water, mind you, this thing was totally insane…"

Perry probably would have snapped back that this suggestion was not helpful if there hadn't been another distraction just then, which came in the form of a large stunning beam smashing through the back window, missing Doofenshmirtz's nose by inches, and whizzing straight into the rear view mirror Perry had been examining. They both shouted in alarm as glass flew everywhere and landed on the carpet floor with a slight tinkling noise. Some landed in the passenger's seat, some in the cup holders, and some went straight through Perry's hologram disguise, landing in his fur. He bristled at the touch of glass and growled, while Doofenshmirtz recoiled sharply in his seat.

"Perry the Platypus, _do _something!" the evil scientist squeaked in terror.

Perry's eyes were now hardly slits, narrowed to a downright dangerous extent. "Oh, I'm gonna do something, all right," he said, voice low and determined. And without warning, he did; he reached over to his seat belt and unbuckled it promptly, one hand still fastened to the steering wheel, then pressed a button to put the window down. A blast of cold air rushed into the car and blew Doofenshmirtz's already wild hair around his head. Doofenshmirtz pushed it out of his eyes hastily, an expression of shock now mixed with the fear he already displayed.

"That's not what I meant!" he exclaimed in a startled voice, while Perry reached behind his back and whipped out a pair of platypus-sized sandals. The sandals appeared to have suction-cups on their flat bottoms, which Perry was obviously planning to use somehow. He quickly slipped them onto his flat feet using only one hand, the other still grasping the steering wheel, and as he did so, he called back to Doofenshmirtz in the back seat.

"Drive!" he ordered, the tone of voice clearly stating that it was not an option.

Doofenshmirtz didn't seem to see it that way. "But-!" he attempted to protest, but Perry interrupted him too quickly.

"There's no time! Norm can't drive himself, remember?" the secret agent shouted over the wind, now standing up in the seat in order to climb out of the window. As he reached the sill, still holding the accelerator down with one of the stilts from earlier, he turned around to glance back at his flustered nemesis. "And," he added, smiling slightly, "it _is _your car."

And with that, he turned to the side of the car and began to scale its outer walls, leaving Doofenshmirtz to get out of his seatbelt and scramble to the driver's seat as fast as his two left feet could get him there.

"Be careful!" Norm warned, cheerful as ever. "We've all got our fingers crossed!"

"You don't _have _fingers, Norm!" Doofenshmirtz pointed out snappishly. As he spoke, he reached the front seat, and after strapping himself in in a rather frantic manner (safety first, right?), taking the wheel and flooring the accelerator once more, he stuck his head out of the window briefly and yelled, "You're out of your mind! And that's coming from a _mad scientist!_"

However, seconds after that, a blast from the minions' stun gun narrowly missed his nose, and he retreated into the depths of the car with a loud and rather shrill yelp.

Meanwhile, on the top of the car, Perry had used his suction-cup sandals to climb onto the roof and was now positioned in the center, digging through his pockets for one of the items he was sure he had remembered to pack on the day he was transported to the future. Icy streamers of wind rushed through his fur and threatened to steal his hat, but their attempts were fruitless. Behind him, the minions seemed bewildered by the sudden and inexplicable act of a young woman (or so it seemed) having climbed onto the roof of her car, and it seemed even stranger when, from behind her back, she finally produced the item that had been so sought after- a large red and yellow ray gun, fully-charged and ready to fire. The minions' eyes widened in alarm, and in response to this, Perry smirked.

He patted the ray gun against one hand, a finger resting on the trigger and a fierce gleam in his dark brown eyes. "Oh, it's on now."

**(It's time for muuuuusiiiiic~ :D Go look up 'BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! HAVE A NICE DREAM' on Youtube, and enjoy!)**

And without further ado, he hefted the gun and opened fire on the enemy car, the sizzling red laser blasts whizzing through the windshield as if it was no more than cellophane. Joe and Dean shrieked loudly as Perry's expert aim took its toll, sending shards of glass everywhere and puncturing holes all over the vehicle.

"Dean, fight back! _Fight back!_" Joe commanded hastily, trying to drive while ducking down as far as he could in the seat. His comrade had merely hunkered down in the cavity beneath the dashboard, seat belt tossed aside carelessly, and was now shivering cowardly with his hands over his head.

"But, Joe-!" he tried to argue, but Joe merely answered, "C'mon, Dean! _Fight!_"

Dean gulped, seized the stunning gun that he had dropped, and popped back up in the seat, aiming the gun out the window once more. This time, instead of aiming for the car, he aimed for the girl on top of it.

"Say goodnight, girlie!" he yelled, and without any further warning, he pulled the trigger.

Another blast of orange-yellow stunning beam shot out of the device, headed straight for Perry, and as he was in the middle of blasting things himself, he only happened to notice it at the last second. Unfortunately, although Dean might not have been a genius, he was a good shot- the blast hit the girl full in the face, dissolving her head instantly. Dean cheered, thrilled with himself; but a moment later, he stopped.

The girl's head was back. And though she looked a little startled at first, she quickly resumed her assault like nothing had happened.

Dean blinked. "Huh?"

Perry just shrugged and pointed his own laser gun at the minions once more. "Close," he muttered, adjusting the aim ever so slightly with one eye squinted shut, "but not close enough."

The blast he sent at them zoomed through a hole in the windshield, aiming straight for Dean's head. The man shrieked loudly as the laser announced his fate, and then-

"AAAIIEEE!"

Joe's head snapped around to see just what horrible thing had happened to Dean to make him scream so loudly, and raised an eyebrow in confusion. His companion had his hands over his head and was now whimpering in terror, but aside from that, he appeared to be perfectly fine; until he turned slowly to face Joe, and it became clear that he had taken a hit. But at least it wasn't serious…

On the contrary, it seemed a bit of a joke.

"Aw, Dean," Joe complained, turning away from the man in disgust. "You had me scared, man! It's just your hair."

Sure enough, the laser blast Perry had sent at Dean had not physically wounded him- but it _had_ seared half his hair off. The remaining half looked rather burnt and black, and to complete the look, his sunglasses were dangling off one ear. Dean looked horrified.

"Don't look, Joe!" he squeaked, turning away to hide his face. "I'm asymmetrical! Disgusting, asymmetrical _garbage!_"

Joe huffed, exasperated. "Seriously, Dean-"

"I shouldn't even be allowed to _live!_" Dean sobbed.

"Then DIE already!" Joe shouted forcefully.

Meanwhile, Doofenshmirtz had finally noticed the profuse amounts of laser shots coming from the roof of the car, and had made up his mind to ask just what was causing them.

"Perry the Platypus, have you got a _laser gun _up there?" he shouted through the window, raising an eyebrow in disbelief and leaning out slightly.

There was an answering blast, and Perry called back distractedly, "Um, mmyep."

"Well, why didn't you use it before? That could have been useful, you know!" Doofenshmirtz shouted, thoroughly exasperated. "Besides, throwing a random laser gun into the plot sounds an awful lot like _lazy writing _to me!"

"Sir, you're breaking the fourth wall again," Norm reminded him calmly.

Doofenshmirtz raised an eyebrow quizzically. "What's that supposed to mean?"

In the minions' car, Dean continued to sniffle into his hands in a pathetic manner. Joe's attempts at motivating him had proved fruitless so far, rendering the two of them helpless- until another laser shot came whizzing through the car once more, slicing off another bit of his companion's hair on the side that hadn't been damaged. At this, Dean's tears stopped abruptly, and slowly, a livid glare overtook his features. Wiping his streaming nose on his sleeve, he straightened in the passenger's seat and lifted the stunning gun once more.

"That's _it!_" he shouted furiously, making even Perry pause and stare at him. "No more Mr. Nice Minion!" And with an earsplitting, rage-filled battle cry, he began to launch a volley of stunning beams in Perry's direction, forgetting to aim and screaming all the time.

Perry's eyes widened, and his eyebrows went up in alarm. He would have to be more careful when choosing whose hair to blast off next time.

All the same, he did not hesitate to dodge a few shots, if only to make the hologram seem a little more believable.

Just then, Doofenshmirtz suddenly yelled, "Perry the Platypus, we're coming to a bridge!"

"So what?" Perry responded, not catching his point.

"It's an overhanging bridge," Doofenshmirtz called back, a note of panic in his voice. "And it's pretty low! If you stay on the roof, then the hologram will probably-"

But before he could finish, a shadow fell over the roof. The sun was suddenly blocked from view, and Perry realized that they had gone under the aforementioned structure. For a moment, he simply glanced up at the surprisingly low ceiling, wondering why Doofenshmirtz had thought it a problem- and then it clicked.

The hologram's head had gone right through the bottom of the bridge.

Perry gulped. That was anything but good. "Doof, I hate when you're right," he called down to his nemesis, half irritated and half upset.

"I was right?" Doofenshmirtz answered in a slightly excited tone. Then he cleared his throat and added, "I mean, of course I was right! You should listen to me more often."

Unfortunately, the hologram glitch had not only been noticed by Perry and Doofenshmirtz, but by the minions as well. In the moments before Norm drove under the bridge, the minions had become quite excited by the fact that their opponent did not seem to be aware that there was a bridge coming right at her head.

"Look, Dean! That bridge'll do our work for us!" Joe shouted gleefully.

"Gross!" Dean agreed with a bloodthirsty roar.

The bridge got closer and closer, until it was right behind the girl- and then, she went right through it.

For a moment, the men just stared, openmouthed, bewildered by the sight before them. Then, it clicked.

"Hey, Dean," Joe shouted, catching the infuriated man's attention vaguely.

"What?" Dean shouted back, yelling as if Joe was at the other end of a football field even though they were seated right next to each other.

"Remember how they were testing holograms back at base?" Joe asked. "Well, either that girl has a skull made of steel, or she's using a hologram too!"

"Wow, a hologram?" Dean mused, in a slightly quieter voice. "That explains why her head didn't go _splat._"

Joe grimaced. "Ew, Dean, that _is_ gross!" he agreed, throwing the man a disturbed glance. "But anyway, I think I've got an idea of who might be using it, so try aiming lower!"

"Lower?" asked Dean, seeming confused. Then he shrugged and returned to his attack. "Well, okay, as long as I get my _symmetrical _revenge!"

And he returned to screaming and shooting, while Joe shook his head in bewilderment. "Y'know, Dean, sometimes I wonder what goes through that insane head of yours."

The initial shots Dean sent at Perry had been aimed at the top half of the hologram, leaving the secret agent no reason to worry- but these were aimed at its legs, which he immediately recognized as a potential disaster. Gasping slightly, he ducked the first few and side-stepped a few more, feet still glued to the roof of the car by the suction-cup shoes. As this went on, Joe smirked, now sure his theory was correct.

"Keep shooting, Dean! You can do it!" he encouraged the enraged man. Dean merely screamed something incomprehensible and fired once more, launching two shots at once. The first flew straight and knocked Perry's ray gun clear out of his hand with a loud _THUNK, _knocking him off balance. The second followed a bit behind the first, but its mark was far worse. Perry only had time to turn his head and see the incoming danger before the laser shot collided with the Disguise-Inator, blasting it right off of his hat and leaving a small singed area in the brown fabric.

Instantly, the hologram around him vanished, and there was only Perry. But he wasn't there long- the laser blast had been too powerful to knock only the Disguise-Inator off, and when it hit, Perry himself was blasted out of his suction-cup shoes and off the roof. As he fell, his hands found a ledge on the open window on the driver's side and he clung to it for dear life, dangling helplessly off the side of the vehicle as the cars continued to barrel down the city road at incredible speeds.

"We got her- uh, him, Dean!" Joe exclaimed gleefully. "Can you believe it? Two fugitives in one day! The boss'll _love _us!"

Dean stopped firing for a split second, a dreamy smile spreading across his face. "Yeah, and we'll get the longer breaks, and the free doughnuts, and-"

"Just keep firing, Dean!" Joe interrupted eagerly. "I can smell those doughnuts now!"

"Oh, right." And the distracted minion quickly crossed to the driver's side of the car, in the seat behind Joe's, and leaned out of the other window to get a better vantage point.

Upon spotting Perry, he bared his teeth in a manic grin and shouted, "You'll pay for making me asymmetrical, duck-beaver!"

Perry heard the shout and the loud _bang! _from the stunning gun, but with both his hands incapacitated and his ray gun gone to who-knew-where, there was nothing he could do to evade it. He shut his eyes, grit his teeth, and prepared for the worst- when suddenly, something grasped his arm and pulled him up and into the car, all in a mere moment. The laser shot darted through the empty air where he had been not a moment before, and before you could say 'velocity' the danger had passed and he was laying on his side, rescued inexplicably at the last second.

For a moment, he did nothing more than breathe heavily, oxygen coursing through him as fast as his lungs could get it in. His heart was pounding in his ears, blocking out even the sound of the cars, and adrenaline coursed through his veins. Confused and more than a little frightened, he opened his eyes a snatch to have a look at what had happened.

From what he could see, he was back inside Norm, laying in the passenger's seat, which was still littered with a few harmless pieces of glass. His fedora, thankfully, was still intact, and he didn't feel hurt, so he deemed it safe to get up. Upon doing so, he was faced with Doofenshmirtz, who, of course, was still in the driver's seat. He looked rather shaken, and a little angry, which didn't surprise Perry.

What _did _surprise him was that the man was the only one who could possibly have saved him.

"_Doofenshmirtz?" _the bewildered platypus tried to ask, but all that came out of his mouth was his usual chatter, which surprised him slightly. He reached up to his hat to feel for the Disguise-Inator, but instead of the small, rounded metal surface, his fingers brushed against the singed and slightly tattered rim of his hat, which had been damaged. Evidently, this meant things would be going back to normal. Sort of.

Finding himself unable to communicate through words, Perry tried to ask his question through gestures. He pointed at Doofenshmirtz, then made a sweeping motion as if pulling something up, and then pointed again at himself with one eyebrow raised in confusion. Doofenshmirtz seemed to get the gist, because his expression suddenly turned sour.

"Yeah, that was me," he confessed, his tone as bitter as his scowl. Perry blinked, looking slightly taken aback, then tilted his head quizzically. "I guess you're probably wondering why I rescued you, huh?"

Of course, Perry nodded in agreement. Doofenshmirtz huffed in an irritated manner. "Fine. But it's a good thing you lost that Translator-Inator, because I don't want to hear a word out of you about this!" He hardly hesitated to explain. "Okay, remember yesterday when you said I still owed you for all those times you rescued me?" The thought only seemed to further irk him, but he continued, staring at the road as he spoke. "…Well, consider this payback for one of them."

Perry didn't reply, being incapable of human speech at the moment- but even if he had been able to, he might not have. To his own surprise, he felt almost…touched. A small, grateful smile crept onto his bill, unnoticed by Doofenshmirtz. However, upon realizing what he was doing, he quickly dismissed it with a shake of his head and replaced it with the usual serious frown he always wore. Then he chattered loudly to get Doofenshmirtz's attention, and when he did, he nodded curtly, by way of a wordless 'thank you'.

Doofenshmirtz seemed a little uncomfortable, but he shrugged. "Uh, no problem, I guess…I mean, don't get used to it or anything. I swear that's the last time I rescue you from certain death."

Perry nodded fervently, hoping that was true- he'd just about had enough of certain death for the time being.

Just then, there was another shattering noise and an explosion of window glass from the back seat, and both of them jumped. The situation seemed to announce itself again, and Perry decided to get down to business.

_We need to end this, _he thought to himself, immediately wracking his brain for a way to do so. But if you have ever been in a life-threatening situation, you will find that the adrenaline that inevitably begins to course through you is enough in itself to impede your thoughts. And sometimes, though we think we can do things alone, it becomes clear that we need a little help. The only problem is asking for it.

And for Perry, it was a real problem- without the Translator-Inator, he couldn't speak. So to communicate this, he chattered loudly to get Doofenshmirtz's attention again, then pointed at his throat. Doofenshmirtz seemed to get the message, because he sighed heavily, despite the situation.

"Oh, all _right,_" he said grudgingly, and he reached up to his ear to remove a small, slightly oval-shaped device, identical to the Translator-Inator Perry had lost. "I brought another from D.E.I. when we left. It's what I used to stow away when we left Vanessa's place. So you can just consider that another favor repaid, okay?"

And he held the device out with his free hand, still gripping the steering wheel with the other. Perry blinked, surprised, and took it anyway. He reached up to the brim of his hat and clipped it onto the singed area where the other device had previously sat, then took a moment to adjust the settings. After doing this, he began to explain.

"Okay, since I can speak again, we need to get them off our tail," he began, getting down to business at once. "Now that they know the both of us are here, they're probably going to call for reinforcements, and if that happens and we're outnumbered, then our chances of escaping don't look good. Unless Norm can still turn into a jet or something…" he paused, glancing hopefully at the dashboard of the car, which had remained mostly undamaged. Norm's voice responded promptly, though it sounded a little fuzzy.

"Systems are mostly down," the robot car replied. "Jet functions are disabled; autopilot is disabled; car systems are still online; radio systems are still online." Then his tone brightened, and he chirped, "Maybe a little music would lighten the mood!"

And before either of the nemeses could tell him it wouldn't, he turned on the radio, which was playing the LOVE MUFFIN anthem. Perry rolled his eyes and turned the volume down.

"Not now, Norm!" he scolded. "We're in the middle of a car chase, for crying out loud!"

"Sorry," Norm apologized. The radio was quickly turned off.

Perry didn't wait to launch back into business. "Okay, listen," he continued firmly. "Like I said, we need to get rid of them. Any ideas?"

Doofenshmirtz shrugged, flinching slightly as another volley of stunning beams flew past the windows, a few of them crashing through what was left of the back window once more. "I don't know, you're the secret agent here!"

Perry growled, exasperated. "Oh, come on! This would be so much easier if you'd just help out a bit! I mean, why couldn't you just build some kind of 'Get-Them-Off-Our-Tail-Inator'? Or, I don't know…an 'Explode-Inator' or something…anything that could help…"

"Well, why not just use a bomb?" Doofenshmirtz pointed out, as if that was perfectly obvious to him. "I mean, seriously. 'Explode-Inator'? Are you kidding me?"

Perry froze, eyes wide, and stared at his nemesis, amazed by his brief moment of clarity. Then, slowly, it occurred to him that once again…

"You're right," he mused, bewildered. "Wow, what is it with you today?"

Doofenshmirtz shrugged, then perked up as the inadvertent compliment sank in. "I'm right? I mean…yeah! You really should listen to me sometimes."

"Don't let it get to your head," Perry countered, serious as ever. But there was one problem with the idea, which caused him to sigh slightly and argue, "And besides, even if that were possible, which I'm not sure it is, what could I possibly use for a bomb?" His laser gun and the other Disguise-Inator had been lost somewhere on the road, and they were likely smashed to bits by now. He hadn't remembered to pack anything else, not even his ever-useful grappling gun, and even if he had, he wasn't sure if he could rig the thing to explode.

"I haven't got anything left," Perry lamented, a cold twinge of defeat in his voice. "Well, except for my hat…and my watch communicator." He glanced back up, wearing a scowl, and noticed that Doofenshmirtz didn't seem to feel the same sense of helplessness that he did. Strangely, the doctor's mouth was twisted in a devious grin, which Perry found very unnerving. Instantly, he reached up with both hands and seized the rim of his fedora with a tight grip, speaking in an anxious tone. "I've had this hat since I can't _remember _when! You wouldn't."

Doofenshmirtz laughed. "I'm not going to use your hat!" he promised, with a quick eye roll. "But if you're not too attached to it, we could use that nifty little watch of yours…"

Perry considered that for a moment, lifting his right hand to see the watch more clearly. Now that Doofenshmirtz mentioned it, since the Agency had fallen to LOVE MUFFIN, the watch didn't really have a purpose anymore. And the situation _was_ desperate.

"Sounds like a good idea," he said uncertainly, "but I'm not sure I know how to rewire it. It's sort of complicated."

"Well, nobody ever said _you_ had to! Here, let's trade." And without waiting, Doofenshmirtz turned around in the seat to reach for a box behind the passenger's seat, leaving a rather stunned Perry to leap for the steering wheel and drive for him. The car swerved dangerously as he struggled to gain control, and when he did, he glanced back at his nemesis with a scowl.

"What are you _doing _back there?" the riled platypus demanded.

"Just a second! I know I've got some spare parts in here somewhere…" Doofenshmirtz answered, his head stuck behind the seat as he pulled the box closer. He then pulled out a handful of machine parts from the box, looked back at Perry, and grinned. "If there's one mechanical skill I've really mastered, it's rewiring just about anything to blow up. Hey, can you hand me that watch?"

Perry raised an eyebrow, but held out his right hand to give the watch to Doofenshmirtz anyway. Doofenshmirtz removed it from Perry's wrist quickly and sat back up in the driver's seat (Perry had to adjust awkwardly until he was practically sitting in the man's lap), then began to connect various parts to the watch very quickly.

Only a few seconds later, he grinned and announced, "Ta-da!" Then he held up the completed work in front of Perry, who frankly couldn't make heads or tails of it. It seemed that Doofenshmirtz had taken the back panel off, switched a few wires, connected a new circuit board, and added a small red button.

"Okay, I'm lost," Perry said, feeling baffled. "What is it?"

Doofenshmirtz rolled his eyes, like it was obvious. "It's a self destruct button! Duh."

Perry was still confused. "But how did you build it so fast?"

"Are you kidding?" Doofenshmirtz laughed. "I've installed so many self destruct buttons, I could do it in my sleep!"

Perry was just beginning to be impressed by that when another stunning beam shot through the back window again. This one flew clear between the passenger's and driver's seats and collided with the dashboard with a loud _CRUNCH, _shocking everyone but Norm.

"There goes the radio," the robot complained, in a disappointed tone.

Now feeling very alarmed, Perry took the watch and hopped back into the passenger's seat, allowing Doofenshmirtz to take the wheel once more.

"All set," Perry confirmed, gripping the watch strap tightly.

"Great. Just press that large, obvious button and it'll blow, okay? And don't miss, or we're toast!" Doofenshmirtz warned. Then he paused and added casually, "But, y'know, no pressure or anything."

Perry huffed, already standing up in the seat to lean out the window. "Thanks, I feel so much better now." He stuck his head out of the window carefully, and tried to get a feel for how he would have to throw the watch. The LOVE MUFFIN patrol car was still behind them, following as quickly as it could, and Dean the minion was still hanging out one of the windows with his stunning gun.

"Hey, Joe," Dean called to his companion, his rage sated for the moment, "the duck-beaver's looking out the window at us!"

"So what?" Joe shouted back, not getting the point. "Just shoot, Dean!"

Just then, Perry deemed it safe to attack. He pushed the button Doofenshmirtz had installed, which emitted a small _beep_.

"Let's hope this works," he muttered to himself to steady his nerves. Then he adjusted his aim, took a deep breath, and tossed the watch-bomb back at the minions' car. For a terrifying moment, he thought it would miss- but a small gust of wind carried it just an inch to the right, and the small device flew through the broken windshield of the car, landing inside with a small _thump_.

At the sound of the improvised bomb landing in the car, both minions turned their attention to Dean's cup holder, where the watch now sat innocently. Dean put a hand over his heart in a touched manner, an obliged smile spreading across his face.

"Aww, isn't that sweet, Joe? He gave us a little gift," he commented, unaware of the danger. "Looky, it's a watch! What's the time, Joe?"

Joe was not so easily fooled. He reached over with his free hand to pick up the watch and examined it closely, keeping an eye on the road as he did so.

Suddenly, he noticed a quiet ticking emanating from the watch, which was vibrating slightly. His eyes widened and he dropped it like a hot coal, then began to shout wildly, "Dean, you moron! That's no gift, that's some kind of bomb!"

Dean blinked. "Oh. Well, I guess it's time for us to explode, then."

_**BOOM!**_

The ringing explosion was accompanied by a splintering sound and the shattering of the remaining glass in the windshield, and in the blink of an eye, the vehicle was blown off of the road. Perry was forced back inside by the blast, and when he looked out of the back window, the minions' car was laying on the side of the street in a heap. Smoke curled up from the steaming wreck, and the minions themselves lay on the grass nearby, having been thrown out of the car mercilessly. The grass seemed to have cushioned their landing, because rather than be hurt, they were both groaning in pain and attempting to sit up.

"Ohh, epic fail," Dean muttered to himself, holding his head. Suddenly, he perked up and grinned- the surface beneath his hands was completely bald. Apparently, his remaining hair had been seared off when he wasn't looking, and he was now symmetrical again. He grinned widely, waving after Norm's retreating tail-lights, and called, "Thank you, Mr. Duck-Beaver!"

Joe just added in a groan, "You _jerk._"

In the car, Perry was grinning as well, but for obviously different reasons. "It worked!" he exclaimed, turning to face his nemesis triumphantly. Doofenshmirtz turned and glanced out the back window briefly, just to see for himself, and instantly broke into a grin with a loud cheer. Norm's dashboard lit up to show his relief, lights blinking everywhere with as much glee as a machine could show.

"I can't believe that actually did it!" Doofenshmirtz shouted joyfully.

"I know!" Perry agreed, his voice sounding both excited and relieved, like he had just won a marathon. In his relief to have survived without capture, he couldn't stop grinning. But then, feeling rather numb, he flopped down in the passenger's seat once more, and his energy abandoned him; it seemed that the adrenaline he felt earlier had evaporated, and all that was left was an extreme tiredness that he could not subdue. Doofenshmirtz, having ceased cheering quite so enthusiastically by now, took notice of his nemesis' exhaustion and watched him for a moment. The car fell unexpectedly silent.

After a moment or two, during which Doofenshmirtz endeavored to drive as well as he could while keeping an eye on Perry, the mad scientist spoke.

"…Okay, _now _what?"

Perry was quiet for a moment, his breathing coming in deep, heavy pants after all the shouting he'd been doing. At last, he glanced up at Doofenshmirtz, at a bit of a loss for words. "I…don't know."

Doofenshmirtz raised an eyebrow. "Well, if you don't know, then I guess I better keep driving while you decide."

Perry instantly frowned sternly. "Wait, wait, just because I told you to drive before doesn't mean you can drive now. For all I know, you'll take me straight to LOVE MUFFIN, or worse-!"

"But Perry the Platypus, didn't it occur to you that we were _both _trying to evade those guys, not just you?" Doofenshmirtz interrupted, looking irritated now. "Look, I'm still bent on capturing you and all, but for now at least, can't you just try to trust me? Besides, you're obviously exhausted. I can see it written all over your face. Don't you think it'd be best to let someone else drive- for instance, someone who hasn't just been shooting at people and falling off of cars?" He paused for a moment to let that sink in, and Perry blinked, surprised. There was some kind of determination in Doofenshmirtz's eyes, as far as he could see, and that could only mean one thing- he wasn't going to give up the wheel easily.

Doofenshmirtz, noting the small pause Perry had allowed, turned back to the road and commented simply, "Why don't you just take a nap or something? We can decide where to go when you wake up."

That really made Perry take a mental step back. "Hang on," he put in, holding up a hand to stall the conversation. "Are you actually…concerned?"

Doofenshmirtz seemed appalled at the very thought. "Me? Oh, for badness' sake, no!" he exclaimed in a shocked voice. "Not for you, anyway. I'm thinking about what'll happen if you try to drive, and then swerve off the road and crash or something. Not good, Perry the Platypus! Not good!"

Perry was quiet for a moment, finding himself lost for a good argument. He _was _awfully tired, and Doofenshmirtz did have a good point, despite his own suspicions. Maybe it was for the best to just let the doctor take them somewhere safe…but he still didn't like it. And he was still confused about something.

"You sounded pretty concerned to me…" he murmured, wondering about the note of worry he was sure he had heard in his nemesis' voice several times that day. However, the Translator-Inator was apparently not compatible with low voices, because Doofenshmirtz could clearly hear him from where he sat.

"I was _not _concerned, I tell you!" he protested, bristling in defiance. "I-I actually was kind of hoping you'd get hurt, so it would be easier to capture you, thank you very much!" And with that, he turned back to the road. Perry raised an eyebrow, still not really believing him. The words were spoken with much bravado, but Perry could have sworn he heard a slightly uncertain pause or two.

All the same, it could have been exhaustion tricking his ears, he supposed. His eyelids were beginning to droop by now, and during the argument with Doofenshmirtz, he had realized just how worn out he was. Apparently, fighting an evil dictatorship could do that to you.

"Anyway, do you have any idea where we're going?" Doofenshmirtz said, interrupting his tired thoughts. "'Cause I don't."

Perry yawned loudly. "Not where _we're _going, where _I'm _going. I said it yesterday and I'll say it again; we are _not _traveling together. Okay?"

"No, we totally are," said Doofenshmirtz, his tone much lighter and almost playful all of a sudden. "You're stuck with me now."

"Are not!"

"Are too, I'm driving!" said Doofenshmirtz triumphantly. "So there!"

Perry was about to snap back, but found himself too tired, so he tried considering the situation instead. He couldn't very well lead Doofenshmirtz to Phineas and Ferb, because…well, he just couldn't. For all he knew, the evil scientist could try to capture them, and it was probably a bad idea for him to even know they existed.

But then, a new thought occurred to him- Candace had said that no one was currently living in the Flynn-Fletcher house, so if the boys weren't there, Doofenshmirtz couldn't threaten them. And besides, Perry couldn't just leave his nemesis behind- it was against his conscience. So he was left with one choice.

He sighed, shutting his eyes tightly and covering them with a hand. "I don't know how I'm gonna put up with you."

Rather than be offended, Doofenshmirtz perked up slightly. "Does that mean-?"

"Yes, fine, you can tag along," Perry consented, with a faint air of reluctance.

"YES!" Doofenshmirtz shouted happily, pumping a fist in the air and grinning even wider than before. Perry watched him for a moment, amused by his reaction.

"It's not all that big of a deal," he pointed out, a little smile tugging at his lips.

"But that means I won the argument!" said Doofenshmirtz smugly. "It's a big deal to _me._"

Perry just rolled his eyes. He had never noticed how trivial some of his and Doofenshmirtz's bickering could be. They really did fight like an old married couple.

Doofenshmirtz, apparently having gotten over his little victory, spoke up again. "Okay, so if I'm allowed to come along, you have to tell me where we're going."

"Fine." Perry reached into his hat and produced a pen and pad of paper bearing the 'Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated' logo, probably nicked from the building. Doofenshmirtz either didn't notice or didn't mind, because he didn't make a fuss of it when Perry handed him a sheet bearing the address. "It shouldn't take long to get there…it never does by hover car, anyway."

Doofenshmirtz studied the address for a moment, then held the paper up to a small camera on the dashboard. "Okay, Norm, you think you can get us here?"

A light came on next to the camera while Norm deliberated, and then he announced, "Sure! It'll be a piece of cake!"

"Oh, good. You can be the makeshift GPS while I drive, okay?"

"No problem!"

As the two of them talked for a moment, Perry's eyelids began to drop once more. Doofenshmirtz and Norm's voices began to fade, mixing into the sound of the road like an odd sort of lullaby, and Perry found himself curling up in the seat before he could give the conscious consent to do so. The bits of glass poking through his thick fur didn't matter; he was too tired to care much about them. In fact, nothing seemed to matter anymore, so long as he got to rest for a moment…he was so tired…

And in a moment, he was out like a light.

"Hey, Perry the Platypus, I know you told me _where _we're going, but why are we going there?" Doofenshmirtz piped up, glancing down at his nemesis. Upon seeing him, he blinked and ceased talking; Perry had curled himself up in a tight ball with his paws crossed before him and placed his hat over his eyes, and he was now making a soft snoring noise. As he slept, his foot twitched a bit to push a leftover shard of glass away, and he made a little snuffly sound. Clearly, he was in no mood to uphold a conversation.

Doofenshmirtz had to suppress a giggle; he wouldn't be able to picture Perry wielding a lethal ray gun for a long time after this. It was just too _cute_. "Uh, never mind. Good night, Perry the Sleepy-pus."

Perry just chirped in his sleep and curled his tail around himself, and Doofenshmirtz returned to driving with a smile. He had to wonder if Perry always slept like this.

"Are you sure he's not your friend, sir?" Norm spoke up.

Doofenshmirtz sighed and glanced skyward in exasperation. "Yes, Norm. I'm sure."

Well. He was mostly sure.

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, farther back on the road, the minions were just starting to get up. Neither one of them was particularly hurt, although they couldn't say the same for their car, and when faced with this disaster, they didn't quite know what to do. However, it wasn't long before Joe's phone (which had miraculously survived) began to ring- and upon answering it, the caller proved to be Rodney and the LOVE MUFFIN board.<p>

"Oh, hello, sirs," Joe said awkwardly, trying not to sound uncomfortable. "Uh, what's up? Found those fugitives yet?"

"Don't play dumb with us," Rodney's voice answered coldly, making the man flinch. "We already know that you found them, and we know they escaped."

Joe froze, and seemed about to start making excuses when Rodney spoke again. "But- it's all right for the moment. You and your partner will escape punishment for now. As for the fugitives…" You could practically hear the smirk in his nasally voice as he spoke. "Let them go."

"Let 'em go?" Joe inquired uncertainly, not sure he had heard right. "But, sir-!"

"That is an order," Rodney cut him off sharply once more (he seemed to have a habit of doing that to people).

Joe blinked, then asked, "So, we won't be chasing them anymore, sir?"

Rodney was quiet for a moment. Then, with a devious sneer, he replied, "For now."

The words were followed with a low roll of sinister laughter, and the call ended.

_To be continued…_


	10. Home is Where the Boys Are

**Author's Notes: **This one was fun to edit, too. But I didn't change a whole lot. :/ Oh well, it was fun to read.  
>edit

This one gets teary at the end, so get out your tissues! It made my mom cry- and even me! XD But that could have been due to the music. Which is totally awesome and sweet! :D Anyhoo, this time around, Perreh is out to find his boys. We'll see how that turns out... ;)

* * *

><p><strong>(First song is up right away. You know it- you love it- go look up 'Come Home Perry'! :D )<strong>

Sunlight fell slanted over high-rise buildings, windows glinting orange-gold in the late afternoon sun. A cool breeze blew through the structures, complemented by a cloudless blue sky and a beautiful view over the city. This was a normal summer day in Danville, but it would be considered far from ordinary nearly everywhere else.

The city was nearly silent. Cars were stopped at the sides of the road with drivers hanging out of the windows. People at work and at home had their windows open, leaning out to listen to the sound now enveloping the city. Peaceful strands of music drifted through the air, sweet and heartfelt, accompanied by a young singer's clear voice. The song, had you been there to hear it, would surely have tugged at your heart, for within the beautiful music there lay a soft plea; a wish that called out to a wandering soul.

_Come home, Perry, come home…_

The song brought the city to a halt, and drew people to the tall skyscraper from whence the sweet strains came. It drew office workers out of their cubicles, tore children's eyes away from their television screens, and brought mothers away from their housework for a well-deserved break.

And, tearing through the sky on a jetpack, it brought Perry.

Head down against the wind, he shot through the city like a blue-green bullet, longing to hear the pure music dedicated to him more clearly. As he swooped between buildings with speed unmatched, his heart called out to them longingly, and he struggled to make out their faces as he approached the music's source. Time seemed to slow down, and yet it was only moments before he landed the jetpack and tossed it aside, joyful tears coming to his eyes as the song came to a close.

"So come home, Perry…come home, Perry, come home…" called the red-headed boy, with a voice that radiated innocence and kindness. His taller brother strummed a few last chords on his guitar, and the two of them chorused, "Come home, Perry, come home…!"

Moved by their devotion, Perry brushed away the tears that had come so close to spilling over and called out to them, his somewhat choked purr carrying across the roof.

The boys perked up and turned around, open smiles of pure elation spreading across their young faces. They spread their arms wide and began to rush towards Perry, who sprinted for the embrace with shining eyes. He leapt into the air and sailed toward his owners, reaching out to them with not only his arms, but all his heart and soul.

Unfortunately, dreams don't usually work that way.

Around him, time slowed to a crawl, and the world began to fall apart like breaking shards of glass. Buildings began to crumble, the road was suddenly veined with cracks, and the land shook fiercely. Even the building on which they stood began to collapse, and as Perry flew through the air towards the boys, a huge crack suddenly split the building in two. The boys skidded to a halt at the edge of the gully, but Perry continued to fall towards it as it grew bigger and bigger. Before he knew it, the chasm had grown to a massive size and he was swallowed by it, lost to a dark world. The last thing he saw was a patchwork square of sky and the boys' distraught faces, reaching out to him from far above as he sped toward the ground at breakneck speed. He tried to call to them at the last minute, but too late- all too quickly, there was a shattering noise in his ears and everything went black.

"_PERRY!_"

His eyes snapped open and were instantly flooded with light, forcing him to shut them again against the harsh late-afternoon sun. The sound of his own breathing and his frantically pounding heart filled his ears, and his adrenaline was running again, as if he had really just fallen into the chasm; but he was laying on something soft, and from the brief flash he had seen of the world around him, it appeared that he was still curled up in Norm's passenger's seat. Well, at least that ruled out the possibility of waking up with a broken neck.

"Hey, Perry the Platypus! Wake up, we're here!"

The German-accented voice came from somewhere above and to his left, and it shook whatever remaining tiredness he had out of him. He opened one eye in a cautious squint and his gaze fell on Doofenshmirtz, who was looking down at him from the front seat with an impatient frown. He seemed like he'd been waiting for a while.

"Good, you're awake," he said, sounding rather irritated. "Like I said, we're here."

Perry exhaled softly and closed his eyes, the dream still weighing heavily on his mind. He didn't want to have to get up; but the longer he waited, the smaller his chances of finding the boys became. Carefully, he opened both eyes again, trying not to let too much light in, and yawned widely. Then, with great swiftness for someone who had just woken up, he pulled himself into a sitting position and peered out of the passenger's side window to see their destination for himself.

Sure enough, they had arrived. There before him was the familiar yellow house, with its brown shingles and shutters, its familiar red door and its cool gray front steps. Doofenshmirtz had parked on the street outside the house, from whence Perry could see that it appeared to have been kept in relatively good shape- the lawn had been mowed recently, the steps were swept, and the bushes out front were clipped neatly. All in all, no huge change had taken place; it was still the house he knew so well.

His heart swelled a bit as he gazed at his longtime home, which had been a safe place for him as long as he could remember. But it sank a bit when a new thought occurred to him- if no one was there anymore, would it still be the comforting haven that he had known? For home was not merely a freshly mowed lawn and a clean walkway- it was the smell of a fresh-baked pie wafting from the kitchen, while the sound of heavy machinery blared outside. It wasn't just the familiar yellow and brown paint job- it was a hug from the boys and a gentle pat from their mother, while Candace spouted some ridiculous-sounding story about whatever mischief had gone on in the backyard that day. Home, to Perry, was more than just a house- it was wherever Phineas and Ferb were.

Which only reminded him that they weren't there.

As he gazed at the house longingly, his mind losing focus once more, there was a loud yawn from beside him. The sound brought him out of his trance sharply, and it wasn't hard to see where it had come from.

In the driver's seat, Doofenshmirtz looked rather bored. He was leaning back in the chair with his arms behind his head, one leg crossed over the other as he waited for Perry to do something. "Well, now what?" he asked. "You never even told me why we're here. What is this, another friend's house?"

Perry sighed, not having the strength nor the will to launch a snappy comeback. "No, it's…" Mid-sentence, he gave up and looked out the window again. "…It's not important."

Doofenshmirtz got the distinct feeling that it was important, but Perry didn't elaborate, so he didn't ask. After all, it was better to get a lengthy silence for a response instead of a punch to the jaw- and if he pressed the subject, the latter seemed very likely. He looked out the window at the house, wondering what it could possibly mean to Perry, while his nemesis reached up to touch the Disguise-Inator again.

"Anyway," he said, pressing a button to switch the mode, "I'm getting out. Default Three."

The teenage boy hologram sprung to life around him, and he wasted not a moment more in opening the side door swiftly and jumping down from the seat to the floor of the car. However, Doofenshmirtz stopped him with a quick, "Wait, wait, wait!"

He turned and peered over at his nemesis, who seemed a bit panicked. "What is it now?"

"What about me?" Doofenshmirtz asked, sounding a little frustrated. "We're officially traveling together now, so don't I get to come?"

Perry considered this carefully for a moment, his eyes narrowed in thought. "You don't have a disguise," he concluded at last, sounding rather stubborn. "What if you blow our cover again?"

Doofenshmirtz blinked. "Um…" Lost for a good response, he turned to the dashboard of the car and demanded, "Norm, help me out here."

Norm's robotic voice answered right away. "You'll have to be _sneaky, _Charlie!"

At this, both Perry and Doofenshmirtz shared a bewildered look. Neither quite knew what to say.

At last, Perry said in a slightly hesitant tone, "Maybe he's more damaged than we thought…"

Doofenshmirtz shook his head. "No, I think he's just been on the internet again."

"Charlie the Unicorn is very amusing," Norm spouted cheerfully, not seeming to mind the fact that neither Doofenshmirtz nor Perry had any idea what he was talking about.

Puting that aside, Doofenshmirtz cleared his throat. "Well, aside from the weird stuff, Norm has a point," he remarked with a smirk. "I'll just be sneaky!"

Then he snickered quietly and added, "…Charlie."

Perry looked skyward with an exasperated frown and sighed heavily. He had several reasons for not wanting Doofenshmirtz to come- one, he was obviously going to be annoying. Two, Perry didn't like the thought of his nemesis in his family's house. And three…well, he didn't have a third one, but if he did, he was sure it would be sound.

Although, as he thought about it, he had to remind himself that Phineas and Ferb weren't in the house anymore- and if even their parents had moved out, there probably wouldn't be any evidence of Perry having lived there with them. So the worst that could happen would be that Doofenshmirtz would miraculously find the boys, or some kind of evidence as to where they were. But that was a long shot. And if he didn't concede, Doofenshmirtz would probably whine about it, which would be even more annoying.

Finally, he face palmed and growled, "You'd better be _really _sneaky."

"Yippee!" Doofenshmirtz exclaimed happily, throwing his arms in the air with a childish grin. Perry just rolled his eyes and hopped out of the car, then started up the familiar cement steps towards the house. Upon realizing Perry had left without him, Doofenshmirtz quickly unbuckled his seatbelt and rushed after his nemesis, making sure to lock Norm (not that it would help much- the windows were smashed to bits anyway). As he caught up, he glanced back at the robot and sighed.

"Y'know," he grumbled, sounding rather miffed, "I distinctly remember you saying you wouldn't bring him back in ruins."

"I said I _probably _wouldn't bring him back in ruins," Perry corrected, a slightly guilty smile resting on his lips. "And besides, I haven't brought him back yet."

Perry reached the front door shortly, with Doofenshmirtz hot on his heels. He didn't wait for his nemesis as he ducked down and began to nose through the cat door, like he always did. Doofenshmirtz paused behind him, seeming confused.

"Um, Perry the Platypus?" he asked, sounding rather bemused (the hologram disguise must have looked very strange, what with its head being stuck through a cat door and its rear being stuck in the air). "What are you doing?"

"Going inside," Perry responded from within, having stuck his head through the door already. He peered around the entrance hall, which appeared to be empty. No coats rested upon the coat rack, because it wasn't there, and the green rug that usually resided in the entryway was missing too. Beyond the hall, he could see the living room, which was also bare- the sofa was gone, as was the television, and even the elephant-shaped lamp on the side table was absent (along with the side table itself). Sure, Perry knew that Linda and Lawrence had moved out- but he hadn't expected the house to be deserted. Maybe no one had moved in yet.

_Well, _he thought, _if that's the case, then it makes my job a whole lot easier._

He poked his head back out and glanced back at Doofenshmirtz. "Doesn't look like anyone's home. I'll go ahead and unlock the door."

Doofenshmirtz, to his surprise, shuffled his feet awkwardly and averted his eyes. "I don't know, Perry the Platypus," he said uncertainly. "Are you sure you know what you're doing, sneaking into somebody's house without even knocking?"

Perry just crawled through the door with a small sigh. "I thought you were evil. Isn't this the sort of thing evil people do?"

"Okay, that is _not _evil," Doofenshmirtz protested stubbornly, as if it was a serious insult to his pride. "That's just creepy."

But a moment later Perry had the door open, and Doofenshmirtz reluctantly followed him inside, muttering angrily about stereotypes the whole way.

* * *

><p>True to Perry's suspicions, it seemed no one had moved into the Flynn-Fletcher house yet, because it was completely devoid of furniture. The silverware was gone from the kitchen; the music room was lacking in music; even the coffee machine was gone (which disappointed Perry considerably- he was still feeling rather sleepy). Further inspection and a trip upstairs showed that Candace and the boys' rooms had been cleaned out as well, and they had also been painted. The stars that had adorned the teenage girl's ceiling had been taken down, and the once purplish-pink walls were replaced by a dull shade of beige. The boys' room was similar- the clouds on their ceiling had been painted over with white, and the bright blue walls were now a much subtler shade of green (which, Perry had to admit, matched very nicely with the brown wooden floor). Seeing the outside of the house had given him the impression that nothing had changed, but upon seeing the inside, a painful realization was suddenly forced on him; eight years had gone by here. Eight long years without his presence, without the boys' presence. And of course, no matter how much it hurt, things had to change.<p>

While Perry inspected the now empty house, Doofenshmirtz was wandering through the lower floors with a distinctly bored visage. He had no idea why Perry wanted to explore this seemingly uninhabited old place, but for him, it was beginning to get dull. All his nemesis wanted to do was wander around with that nostalgic look on his face, sighing now and then and generally ignoring Doofenshmirtz's presence. For his part, the mad scientist had found a few interesting scorch marks in the garage that looked like they'd been caused by some kind of explosion, a floorboard that flipped and trapped your foot if you stepped on it the right way, and a bit of glass that was stuck in his shoe (ouch). So far, the trip was absolutely _thrilling._

After a while, Doofenshmirtz decided that Perry's tour of the house was far too dull for him, so he wandered out to the backyard and took a seat under the towering tree that grew there. Perry, surprisingly, wasn't far behind- it seemed his search hadn't gone well. He opened the sliding glass door with a scraping noise and padded into the backyard, his shoulders slumped slightly in disappointment. Upon seeing Doofenshmirtz stretched out under the tree, he shrugged to himself and went to sit beside him, leaning against the tree with his hands crossed over his chest as he stared at the bits of sunlight filtering through the softly fluttering leaves.

He closed his eyes and tried to imagine the boys sitting on either side of him, probably chatting about whatever they planned to do that day. Phineas would still have that big, enthusiastic grin that he always had, and Ferb would probably be reading a book calmly or examining some blueprints. For just a moment, Perry almost let himself believe that they were there with him- but Doofenshmirtz's voice cut through his daydreams almost immediately.

"So, Perry the Platypus, did you find what you were looking for?"

Perry's eyes snapped open again, and he shook his head with a sigh. His thorough search of the house had yielded no evidence of either Phineas or Ferb; only a strong loneliness. "No, I didn't…"

"Well, so much for that," Doofenshmirtz said, in a light tone that Perry couldn't help but bristle at. He knew that his nemesis didn't have the same concerns as he did, but his carefree attitude was still aggravating nonetheless.

Oddly, Doofenshmirtz seemed to notice this. He glanced over at the secret agent, whose face was clouded by doubt and frustration, and frowned. "Perry the Platypus, is this going to be one of those things that you never bother to tell me, but you probably should?"

Perry shook his head pointedly, staring at the leaves again and imagining some large machinery going through the backyard. Maybe a forklift or something. Phineas had always loved those.

Irked, Doofenshmirtz stood up sharply, keeping his eyes on Perry with an annoyed expression.

"Look, you're starting to tick me off," he complained with a scowl. "I mean, seriously! Your bad mood is infectious."

Perry pulled himself out of his fantasy reluctantly and glared at his nemesis. "Well, excuse me, princess. I can't help it if I'm not happy-go-lucky like you all the time."

"Did you just reference that old Zelda TV show?" Doofenshmirtz demanded, raising an eyebrow leaning against the tree with one hand placed on its bark. "'Cause if you did, then, that's pretty lame- and if you didn't, then don't call me princess!"

However, before he could complain further, something happened that neither of them could have predicted; Doofenshmirtz's hand, which had been resting on a mysteriously square-shaped section of bark, suddenly sank into the tree, causing him to yelp in alarm. Almost immediately, a door opened in the tree, activated by the secret switch Doofenshmirtz had accidentally pressed and revealing a secret space within the trunk.

Doofenshmirtz blinked in surprise. Perry gasped sharply, alarms going off in his head. He knew that door very well- it was the same one Phineas and Ferb had once discovered (in exactly the same manner as Doofenshmirtz), which led directly to his underground lair. And Doofenshmirtz, of all people, definitely wasn't allowed inside.

"Oh, cool! What's this, some kind of secret room?" the doctor chirped, ducking down to enter the space.

Heart thumping wildly, Perry instantly leapt to his feet. "No! It's nothing! Don't go in there!"

But Doofenshmirtz had already squeezed into the tree hollow and was sitting in the back with his arms wrapped around his drawn up knees. "It's kind of cramped in here," he stated blandly, gazing around at the walls. "Like it wasn't made for people or something. Weird, huh?"

"Captain Obvious strikes again," Perry muttered to himself as he dashed in after Doofenshmirtz and tried to pull him out frantically. "For heaven's sake, Doof, would you _please _go along with me just this once!"

"Why? What's so bad about me being in here?" Doofenshmirtz asked defensively, staying put as best he could.

But it was too late. The door closed abruptly and a light came on, and the elevator jerked downwards, shooting through the ground under the backyard at an astounding speed. Doofenshmirtz yelped at the sudden movement of what he had thought was a stationary room, and Perry's hands flew to his hat in panic, gripping its brim with white knuckles.

"No, no, no, no, no!" he exclaimed frantically. "Argh, I can't believe Carl never fixed this entrance!"

"Wait, Carl? You mean 'Dr. Coconut' Carl or some other Carl?" Doofenshmirtz piped from his awkward sitting position in the back of the elevator. Suddenly, his face lit up with a devious grin. "Heyy, does that mean this is an entrance to your secret base or something? Jackpot! Now I can discover all your deepest secrets!" He cackled evilly to himself for a moment, then added, "And does that mean you live in that house, too? Wow, I really got more than I bargained for."

Perry growled to himself in a half infuriated, half despairing way. "Did you get smarter in this future or something?"

Doofenshmirtz bristled at that and was probably about to attempt a snappy comeback, when there was a high pitched _ding, _and the elevator door opened once more. Perry's eyes widened and he braced himself for whatever Doofenshmirtz would do- but as soon as he saw what lay beyond the door, he blinked, startled, and paused. Doofenshmirtz, who had been about to get up, did the same.

Ahead of them was not the bluish-white cavern of a room and familiar technology that made up Perry's lair, but a small white room with a single light and no furnishings to speak of. The walls had absolutely nothing on them- no color, no portraits, certainly no telescreen, and no doors to offer an exit. Perry had no idea what the room was, when it had gotten there, or why, but he was rather curious to find out. Slowly, cautiously, he edged his way into the room, taking note of the single fluorescent light bulb that hung from the ceiling. Behind him, he could hear Doofenshmirtz getting out, too, although he wasn't as quiet.

"_This _is your secret base?" he asked, sounding a little crestfallen and certainly baffled. "Wow. That's it? I mean, I thought you'd have some big place with a telescreen or something, and, I don't know, a bunch of secret agent-y gadgets and stuff. And this color scheme, really? Plain white? I thought you were all into blue and stuff."

"I am," Perry answered, his voice low and wary. "All I know is-"

Suddenly, the lights were switched off. Perry's voice, sounding rather shocked, echoed in the darkness.

"This is not my base."

Then, as panic began to rise once more in his chest, the floor beneath their feet swung open like a trap door and they were falling, Doofenshmirtz shrieking wildly as he plummeted towards who-knew-where. Despite his usual seriousness, Perry found himself yelling along with him in a voice similar to his usual chatter, heart pounding in his ears as he tumbled through the air. As he fell, a new thought occurred to him. Maybe this was what the Agency did with their secret bases when they decommissioned them; turned them into simple white rooms with pitfall traps. Maybe it was a good thing Phineas and Ferb weren't here to see this.

The fall only lasted a few seconds, and before either of the nemeses knew what had happened, they had tumbled out of a chute and landed on the floor below, in an dimly-lit underground room. Doofenshmirtz landed flat on his chest, his chin hitting the floor painfully, and Perry landed right on top of him with his arms and legs stretched out. Both of them were still for a moment while Doofenshmirtz groaned in pain, and Perry attempted to restore feeling to the tips of his fingers and tail. As he did so, eyes shut in pain, he heard a small gasp from Doofenshmirtz and glanced up-

Only to find that they were surrounded.

Circling them and aiming what looked like very long laser guns at them was a group of very serious-looking people, all dressed in tight-fitting uniforms of black and wearing what looked like armor. They had their eyes locked on Perry and Doofenshmirtz, and Perry got the distinct feeling that if he moved a muscle, they wouldn't hesitate to shoot.

"So I see we have visitors," boomed a deep voice from the back of the room. Perry's fur prickled. He knew that voice. "Now, don't be afraid…unless you're from LOVE MUFFIN."

And out of the crowd stepped another man, holding his own laser gun. "Then you'll have plenty of reason to be afraid."

Perry's eyes widened in shock and his muscles relaxed slightly. He _did _know that voice- for there before him stood Major Monogram, looking older than last Perry had seen him but no less serious and determined. His hair was as white as ever, his mustache was well-trimmed, and his ever-present unibrow was furrowed in a suspicious frown. His clothes still featured the large purple '_MM'_,but they were the one part of him that had changed; he was dressed in the same armor and black uniform as the others, albeit a bit looser. Thankfully, Perry also noted that he was wearing pants.

Monogram examined the visitors carefully, and when his gaze landed on Doofenshmirtz, his unibrow shot up in surprise and he exclaimed, "Great googly-moogly! Dr. Doofenshmirtz?"

Doofenshmirtz's pulse quickened. From his position on the doctor's back, Perry couldn't see his expression, but he knew the doctor was probably scared. "Uh…hi, Monobrow," he squeaked nervously, giving a crooked grin.

Monogram definitely looked baffled. "What are you doing here, and how in the world did you find us?"

Doofenshmirtz raised an eyebrow, feeling rather puzzled. "'Us'? Us who?" he asked, craning his neck to meet Monogram's eyes and opening his own a little wider.

"Why, The Rebellion, of course," Monogram responded, as though that were obvious. When Doofenshmirtz's only response was to widen his eyes in shock, he added, "You mean to tell me that you weren't specifically searching us out?"

"No, I-!" Doofenshmirtz started to protest, but his words fell flat. He was quiet for a moment, and then he turned his head slightly to look at Perry, who was sitting awkwardly between his shoulder blades and staring at him with a very stunned gape.

"_You,_" he uttered, his voice icy. Perry gulped, unsure of how to respond to that, but he was saved by Major Monogram.

"And who's your friend here?" the major asked, jabbing the laser gun in Perry's direction. "Another agent of LOVE MUFFIN?"

Doofenshmirtz glanced up at him, then looked back at his nemesis once more, realizing the same thing that was just dawning on Perry himself- he was still in disguise, and Monogram didn't recognize him.

"Okay, first of all, he is _not _my friend! I don't know why all you people are so convinced of that," Doofenshmirtz snapped, obviously very irritated now. "And second of all, that's a disguise."

A ripple of surprise went around the room. Major Monogram raised his unibrow. Doofenshmirtz just rolled his eyes and waved his hand around behind his back, sweeping right through the hologram and causing it to flicker slightly. "See? It's. All. Fake."

"So you came here alone?" Monogram asked, bewildered.

Meanwhile, Perry had finally found his voice. "No," he answered quietly. "He wouldn't have come here in the first place if not for me, and I didn't even know this would happen."

Major Monogram turned his gaze on Perry instead. "And you are…?"

The platypus agent gave a small smile, and reached up to the Disguise-Inator. With the press of a button, the hologram dissolved into static and then disappeared, and all that was left was Perry, spread-eagled on Doofenshmirtz's back and looking rather sheepish. Another wave of shock was sent through the crowd, and Major Monogram gasped.

"A-Agent P?" he exclaimed, thoroughly stupefied.

In response, Perry lifted his hand to his temple in a salute, still grinning in embarrassment. "Reporting for duty."

Monogram still seemed amazed, and he did not do anything but stare for a moment; but after a bit, he lowered his laser gun and managed an answering salute. Slowly, around him, the other soldiers mirrored him and saluted Perry, until he was saluting not only Monogram, but everyone in the room.

Doofenshmirtz, who was squashed underneath him and therefore the only person not saluting, snorted under his breath. "Great. Now can you please get off of me?" he muttered sulkily, earning himself a light slap from Perry's tail.

Monogram lowered his hand, emulated by the crowd and Perry. "Well, Agent P, I must say it's a surprise," the major said, his eyes still very wide. "When you never came back from your last mission, Carl and I assumed you were…" he trailed off, and Perry understood. They probably thought Doofenshmirtz had somehow destroyed him somehow, once and for all.

He shook his head. "No, sir, it was just an accident with a time machine," he explained concisely.

Monogram raised half of his unibrow. "Well. I guess that's…preferable." He cleared his throat. "Now, Agent P, how did you find us? And did you really come here with him?"

He jabbed a thumb at Doofenshmirtz, who mumbled, "I have a name, y'know."

Perry nodded. "Yeah, we did come here together. I wasn't actually looking for the resistance, though. I was looking for…" he paused, glanced at Doofenshmirtz nervously, and then said, "…for the boys."

Major Monogram blinked, then gave a smile. "Well, don't worry about that, Agent P. I think there are two people who know exactly where your boys are."

Perry's face lit up with a smile. "There are?"

Major Monogram nodded. "Yes, yes there are."

Perry immediately leapt off of Doofenshmirtz and said, "Well, where are they?"

"Back at camp," Monogram answered matter-of-factly. "We'll just have to get you over there right away."

Perry nodded fervently, fully prepared to find his boys. Monogram turned and gestured to the crowd to part, which they did, and he began to lead Perry through them. However, halfway through, the agent stopped and glanced back at his nemesis, still lying on the floor.

"What about Doof?" he asked hesitantly, a bit concerned. "What do you plan to do with him?"

"Oh, don't worry about him, Agent P," said Monogram, his tone brisk and businesslike as usual. Perry was about to protest that he would never worry about Doofenshmirtz, of all people, when the major added, "He'll get what he deserves."

Doofenshmirtz gulped and glanced up at the group of resisters surrounding him, looking from one face to the next. Then he looked back at Perry, with a nervous waver in his eyes. "Perry the Platypus…?"

Perry held his gaze for a moment, wondering uneasily what was in store for his nemesis; but at length, he decided that the boys were more important, tipped his hat politely, and followed Monogram out of the room.

On the floor, Doofenshmirtz's pitiful expression changed to a disappointed frown. "I should've just stayed at Vanessa's."

Elsewhere, Monogram led Perry through a door and down a brightly lit hallway with white walls, which made Perry cover his eyes in pain. When next he opened them, Monogram had reached the end of the hallway, where one of the tube slides from his lair appeared to be embedded in the wall. The major turned to face him with his hands tucked behind his back.

"These underground tubes are from the remains of your base, Agent P," he told the agent. "This one will take you to the resistance camp. I'll have Carl pick you up there- I've got to go deal with Doofenshmirtz."

Perry nodded and began to climb into the tube, making sure not to slip and fall. Just before he had fully climbed in, Monogram's eyes widened again and he exclaimed, "Cheese and crackers, Agent P, I nearly forgot! How the blazes are you speaking _English?_"

Perry grinned as he jumped into the tube. "Translator-Inator, of course." And with that, he was gone, shooting through the underground slide before you could wave goodbye.

* * *

><p>One long slide ride later, Perry shot out of another tube and landed in a catlike stance, then stood and dusted his fur off. Upon looking up, he was immediately faced with the pale, freckly visage of Carl the intern, who was standing by the tube patiently. He looked older than Perry had last seen him, and he was wearing the same outfit as the rest of the resistance members, but he was mostly the same- his glasses were still firmly in place and very square, and he looked as cheerful as ever.<p>

"Oh, hi, Agent P!" he said in his nasally voice, accompanied by a smile and a wave. "Major Monogram told me you were coming. It's great to see you again!"

Perry tipped his hat politely. "Good to see you too, Carl. Still working for the Agency?"

"Nah, more like the rebellion now- heyy!" He paused, eyes wide, and exclaimed, "I didn't know you could talk!"

Perry shrugged and tapped the Translator-Inator, still perched on the brim of his hat. "I can't really. It's this translator," he explained. "I think Doofenshmirtz got smarter since I last saw him."

"That's a definite yes," said Carl, his face darkening a little. He was silent for a moment, so Perry cleared his throat to get him going again.

"So, Monogram said something about the boys, and people who could help me find them…" he prompted, causing the intern to jump in alarm.

"Oh, that's right!" he yelped. "Come on, Agent P, they'll want to see you right away!" And without further ado, he grabbed Perry's hand and dragged him away from the tube.

As they ran, Perry took note of his surroundings- he appeared to be above ground again, because the sky above was looking as sunny as ever, and there was grass on either side of the worn dirt path they were following. Along the path was an array of tents, all sporting solar panels on their roofs, and a few resistance members milling about between them. Some waved to Carl as he passed and a few called greetings, which the intern did not respond to other than to wave cheerily.

Eventually, after a lot of running, they reached the end of the path, where a very large tent rested. The tent was different from the others in that it had windows on the sides and what looked like an electronic door on the front, which slid open when they approached. Carl rushed right in and stopped in the entryway, which appeared to function as a waiting room. Hardly anyone was there; a few people were sitting in chairs that lined the walls, waiting patiently for something. Carl stopped in the center of the room and turned to face Perry, out of breath.

"Well- (pant)- here we are- (pant)- Agent P," he wheezed, bending over with his hands on his knees. Also breathing hard, Perry took the opportunity to glance around and saw that the room had another door, which presumably led to an office of some sort. The people in the waiting room were all staring at him now, probably bewildered as to what a fedora-wearing platypus was doing in the resistance camps.

"Carl, where is this?" he asked in between breaths.

"This is the leaders' office. T-they can help you," Carl answered, still huffing loudly. Then he straightened up and looked around the room, saying, "Everyone, this is Agent P. He needs to get in there as soon as possible, so it looks like you'll have to wait a minute."

There was a general grumbling amongst the few people that were there, but none of them argued. Carl turned to Perry once more, wearing a smile.

"Well, you can probably go in now, Agent P," he said, giving the thumbs up.

Perry nodded and flashed him a grateful smile. "Thanks, Carl."

"Oh, no problem," said Carl cheerfully, and he exited the tent.

Perry watched him go until the door had closed, and then turned to face the door. It was much taller than him, seemed to be made of metal, and looked automatic, which he found odd, considering it was in a tent. At least he wouldn't have to reach up for the handle, he supposed.

But, before he entered, Perry had to wonder; could the leaders of the rebellion really help him find Phineas and Ferb? What would they know about two young boys that had lived in Danville eight years ago? Even Perry knew precious little about their location- for all he knew, they could have moved to Japan without telling anyone and were currently working a noodle stand in downtown Tokyo.

And what would these leaders be like? Would they be hardened military generals who had been fighting all their lives, or would they be ordinary people? Was this just another fight, or did it mean everything to them? And either way, how could they possibly know anything about the boys?

_Stop right there, _Perry told himself firmly. He was letting his thoughts wander again. The only really important thing here was to go through that door and have a talk with these leaders, to see whether they could be of any help to his cause. If they did know something, then it was worth asking about- and if they didn't, then they could at least help him search. He had been planning to find the resistance at some point anyway, after all.

He straightened up, looked up at the door with a determined air, and strode toward it steadily. The metal door slid open as he approached, and he stepped through into the leaders' office.

**(Music time again! This time it's Fix You by Coldplay.)**

As the door closed behind him, Perry looked around the place with wide eyes. It was a very big tent, sporting another two doors in the back and a skylight in the ceiling. The interior would have been well-lit, due to natural light and a few lamps on the walls, but at the moment the skylight was covered and the lamps were turned down low. The cause of this was probably the table in the center of the room, which appeared to be casting a hologram on top of it and emitted a soft green glow. The hologram showed what looked like a 3-D map of Danville, with small markers were positioned all over it. Perry wasn't quite sure what it was, but it looked complex.

The next thing Perry noticed was the two people leaning over the table, who seemed to be studying the map and had their backs facing him. They were wearing the same tight-fitting black uniforms as the other resistance members, but lacked the armor that the others had worn. One of them was tracing his finger along part of the map, pointing at various objects and moving the markers around, and he seemed to be in the middle of explaining a very complex battle strategy.

"…So then we'll have troops six, seven, and two lay siege to this outpost," he said conversationally, pointing to various objects on the holographic map. "After that, you and I will lead troops ten and eighteen to this building here-" he pointed to another building on the map- "and overtake it. Sound good?"

His companion lifted a hand and gave the thumbs up, without saying anything.

As he listened to this, Perry couldn't help but feel that he knew that voice somehow. It sounded like a young man's voice- perhaps a teenager's (he had to wonder just how young these leaders were) but it wasn't particularly deep. If anything, it was higher than most men's voices that Perry had ever heard. It had a kind of friendly, casual tone to it, like the plans he was making were no more than a plan for how to win a chess match, or the instructions for how to solve a kind of puzzle. And there was something else…something Perry couldn't quite define…that set the voice apart from any other he'd ever heard. No matter how much thought he gave it, he couldn't put his finger on it.

In the midst of these thoughts, the second man turned slightly and saw Perry standing in the entryway, watching the two of them intently. Perry couldn't see much of his face, but he saw the eyes widen suddenly, and recognized that it really looked more like a teenager than a grown man. He reached over and tapped his friend's shoulder, and then glanced pointedly at Perry again. The other boy, the one who had spoken, glanced over his shoulder as well, and his eyebrows shot up. Slowly, wordlessly, the two of them turned around to face Perry, faces illuminated not only by the green glow cast by the holographic table, but by hope and amazement.

As they turned, Perry's heart stopped. He felt his eyes grow hot as the world began to blur, and he blinked furiously to clear his eyes of the rising tears. The familiar faces stared back at him, framed by the brightly colored hair he'd known for years- older faces, certainly, but no less familiar. It couldn't be…

But it was.

They simply stared for a heart-stopping moment, and the world was silent. Then, slowly, an open smile began to spread across the redhead's young face.

"_Perry._"

None of them spoke for a moment; they didn't need to. Then, in an instant, he was in their embrace and the both of them were holding him, all of them trembling a little as tears streamed down their faces.

"Perry," Phineas' voice was trembling just the littlest bit, but it was still soothing to the platypus' ears. "Oh, Perry…we thought we lost you…"

Perry found himself unable to speak once more, even though the Translator-Inator was still perched on the rim of his hat. All he could do was hang on tighter. For a long time, what seemed ages, they stayed just like that; just Phineas, Ferb, and Perry, each holding on to the other with all his might, afraid to let go. At last, Ferb's calm, steady voice spoke.

"We have _so_ much catching up to do…"

_To be continued…_

* * *

><p>So what did you think? :D I didn't go overboard or anything, did I? 'Cause this is a kind of sensitive scene and I don't wanna screw it up. XDDoof, I'm sorry to say, won't show up again 'til chapter 12 or so, maybe 11. But the boys came in, yay! So Perry will of course be spending all his time with them. ^_^<p>

Oh! I nearly forgot! I did some art for this chapter recently. It's on my dA page, which you can find a link to in my profile. ^-^


	11. That Rebellious Phase

**Author's Notes: **For this one, I decided to change the boys' reason for remembering stuff. It didn't make a whole lot of sense before.

Now, I think this new reason may have been used somewhere else, but as I don't remember where, I'll just put a disclaimer here; the idea's not mine.

/edit

First off, I just want to state that this chapter has a lot of similarities to the movie- but there's a reason behind that. ;) So there's spoilers, in case you haven't watched it yet. This is now stated in the description. (Well, sort of. I guess it's a bit cryptic- if you don't know what ATSD means, you're likely to run into a few issues. XD)

Oh, and credit goes to my sister for coming up with the dialogue for the befuddlement beam scene. My other sister and I once dared her to say the craziest, most senseless thing she could come up with, which just so happened to be; "Hello, potatoes! Don't dance, or you'll die!"

And so this scene was born. -3-

So, now that we've got that over with, enjoy the chapter! :)

* * *

><p>It was with an uneasy feeling that Perry awoke that night, fur prickling and heart pounding fit to burst in his ears. For a few moments, he was absolutely still, locked in a cold sweat brought on by a dream too sweet to be real. Perhaps none of it had really happened, after all, and he was still resting in Norm's passenger seat while the robot drove on and on. That night, doubt swirled in his mind and made anything possible.<p>

With his eyes still closed, he could not see where he was, but he could hear crickets chirping, and the sound of someone breathing softly. A hand reached down and stroked his side, bringing with it a tingling wave that soothed him. Instantly, his fears were quelled; for he found it quite evident whose hand it was.

Opening an eye drowsily, he saw the comfortably-padded sleeping bag that he was sleeping on, which was lying on the floor of the dark tent that stretched over his head. Moonlight poured in through a nearby window, illuminating the covers of the sleeping bag in a soft ice blue. Perry smiled and looked over his shoulder, where the occupant of the bed slumbered softly. Smiling in his sleep, Phineas' youthful face was illuminated by the moonlight that reflected off of Perry's thick teal fur, and his hand continued to stroke the platypus' side drowsily. For a moment, Perry watched him breathe in and out, his chest rising and falling peacefully, and then he turned to get up. By then, he deemed the time right to switch to Ferb's bed, which was just a few feet to his right beside Phineas'.

Standing up with a small chirp to announce his exit, Perry stepped out of the sleeping bag and crossed the floor to Ferb's, then jumped in lightly to land next to the slumbering green-haired boy. He laid down in a heap beside his taciturn owner, and instantly, Ferb's arm was around him, holding him close. A peaceful smile spread over the boy's lips, mirrored by Perry as he closed his eyes. It was one of the few times over the past few days when he had felt truly at peace, and he felt he had to savor it.

As he began to drift back into sleep, Perry could not help but let his mind wander back to the events of that day, which, to put things lightly, had been an eventful one. It seemed to have been ages since he and Doofenshmirtz had arrived at the Flynn-Fletcher house, and his departure from Vanessa's was a distant memory. But his first day in the Rebellion camp was vividly engraved in his memory, and as he settled down under Ferb's protecting arm, he allowed the events to replay behind his closed lids. It did not take long to recall his favorite memory of the day by far…

* * *

><p>Soon after their reunion embrace had ended, Perry was offered a seat in the boys' tent, in front of the two teenagers in question. The three of them were all a little teary, but they were also growing tired of squeezing the air out of each other, so the only thing left to do was talk. And Ferb was right; they did have a lot of that to do.<p>

Phineas was the first to find his voice- slightly choked, but still usable- and he began to speak. "Oh, Perry," he started blissfully, as if he loved being able to say the name again. "Ferb and I were so worried about you…you don't know how happy we are just to see you alive."

Perry nodded numbly- he knew the feeling. At that moment, he would have loved to tell the boys how much he had missed them as well, but he found himself incapable of speech once more; whether it was because he didn't want to speak in front of the boys or he was too choked up, even he couldn't tell. Phineas understood anyway- he was quite used to silence thanks to Ferb.

"I guess you're probably wondering a lot of things," said Phineas, his cheerful mood recovering slowly. "Like why we're in hiding, leading a rebellion, and not freaked out by your hat and sudden intelligence."

Perry nodded again. Though it was still resting in its rightful place atop his head, he had completely forgotten about his fedora in all the excitement- but he was too elated to care much about it now.

Phineas cleared his throat, offering a slightly apologetic smile, and said, "Let me explain. Our story really starts eight years ago…on the best day ever."

Perry smiled, remembering the various days Phineas had dubbed the 'best day ever' (there were an awful lot of them). Feeling that he rather needed to be clear on which of these his owner was referring to, he cleared his throat and tried to speak. "Um, Phineas," he started, his voice a little choked, "refresh my memory- which best day ever are we talking about?"

Phineas' smile was wide and jovial now, as if he was lost in memories of those long-gone summer days. "Oh, not just any old 'best day ever'." Then, with a knowing grin, he added, "I'm talking about _the _best day ever."

This time, Perry blinked. He did know one day which Phineas had referred to as such…but that was impossible, thanks to a secret he needed to keep and a certain amnesia-inducing machine. However, Phineas was unfazed by his sudden confusion.

"Oh, you remember," he said, with a casual flip of the hand. "Y'know, the whole second-dimension-oh-my-gosh-our-pet-is-a-secret-ag ent-save-the-world adventure. Ring a bell?"

Perry, rather baffled now, nodded slowly. "But, you guys," he said hesitantly, "I thought you…well, the Amnesia-Inator and all that…"

Phineas nodded, scratching his ear in a slightly uncomfortable way. "Yeah, about that…it didn't work."

This time, Perry was rather taken aback. He wasn't quite sure what to say, but he did manage to stutter, "It…didn't?"

Phineas shook his head, his pleasant smile returning quickly. "Nope."

Perry just stared for a moment. Then he cocked his head, raised an eyebrow, and asked, "Then, what happened?"

Phineas scratched his ear awkwardly. "Well, the thing is, Ferb and I were wearing our personal helmet-head systems for the battle with Doofenshmirtz…and we kind of forgot to take them off."

Perry shook his head in amazement. "Then…you remember everything?" he asked slowly, feeling rather numb again.

Phineas' grin widened a little. "Yeah…and, may I just say that regardless of any circumstances, I can say with confidence that Ferb and I have not changed our opinion since the day we first stated it; pet, agent- they're both you." He smiled affectionately, and Ferb added the final words.

"And we still love you," he said, his deep British-accented voice accompanied with a loving smile. Perry felt his cheeks grow hot once more, and a touched smile graced his features. Almost immediately, Phineas reached out to give him another hug, which he accepted happily. Ferb joined in, and they stayed like that for a few moments.

At last, when they parted, Perry suddenly remembered something else. "Hey, Phineas," he said, his voice taking on an almost sly tone, "if you really didn't have your memories erased by the Amnesia-Inator, then do you really remember _everything?_"

Phineas raised an eyebrow, still smiling, and replied, "Yeah…why?"

"Well, I can't help but wonder," Perry continued sneakily, "if you remember a certain girl…"

Phineas' cheeks reddened slightly, and behind him, Ferb burst into silent giggles. As the green haired boy strove in vain to cover his laughter, Phineas nudged him with his elbow, grinning sheepishly. "Fe-rb!" he protested, to no effect other than making Ferb laugh harder. At last, he rolled his eyes, still smiling through the heavy blush, and answered the question with a rather coy, "May-be…"

Perry snickered quietly, while Phineas glanced away in embarrassment. Then he asked, "And what about Isabella? Does she remember?"

Phineas shrugged, clearly wondering the same thing himself. "Either she took her helmet off early," he remarked, "or she's fakin' it real good."

Perry snickered quietly to himself, but before he had the chance to make any speculations about that, Phineas cleared his throat in an attempt to regain his dignity and said, "Now, can I _please _tell the rest of the story?"

And without further ado, he did. As Perry listened, Phineas proceeded to explain that after the second dimension incident, he and Ferb had tried to keep living like nothing had happened. Of course, not everything went back to normal- whenever Perry vanished, they would both wish him luck silently, and when he returned, they would thank heaven that he was safe. For a long time, everything seemed like it would work out- but it couldn't last forever.

"One day," Phineas explained, seeming just a tad more serious, "Ferb and I were sitting under the tree, talking about stuff. One of the topics that happened to come up was you- 'cause recently, it seemed to us that you'd been getting a little distant. Additionally, there were times when we'd find you had left your breakfast untouched, or when we'd discover that the litter box had seemingly been unused for days. Well, I just figured you'd finally taken our advice and started cleaning it yourself, but clearly, that was not the case."

Perry grinned sheepishly and fixed his gaze on his feet. "Yeah, about that…" he said, tail twitching awkwardly. "I always figured you guys would think it was weird if it never needed cleaning…"

Phineas laughed cheerfully and patted his pet on the shoulder gently, brushing it aside. "No, that's okay. Truth be told, it _would _be weird- and in this case, it was."

Phineas went on to explain that it wasn't long afterwards, just around the time when LOVE MUFFIN achieved domination over the city, that he and Ferb made a shocking discovery- the pet they thought was Perry had turned out to be an android, a robot version of the secret agent that had been deployed by the Agency when he vanished, to keep the boys happy until they could find him again. But they never did…

"…Of course, Ferb and I were worried right away," Phineas told Perry sincerely, looking a bit concerned as he spoke. "We knew something must have happened, so we tried to get in contact with the OWCA and ask about it- but by the time we called them, they'd been scattered by LOVE MUFFIN already. Then, after a lot of scouring the phonebook, we found Major Monogram's home number and called him there- only to discover that he was in hiding from the dictators, and you were MIA." Here he paused, clearly troubled, and added, "Well, actually…he was pretty sure you were KIA."

_Killed in action._

Perry's heart skipped a beat sickly as the words sunk in. He had already known that the boys had worried about him in his absence, and that the situation had brought Candace to tears, but only then did the full meaning of it hit him suddenly. He stared up at the boys with wide eyes, and saw that they both seemed to be feeling the same way. Phineas' shoulders were hunched up and he was staring at the floor determinedly, while Ferb's brow was furrowed in a worried fashion. This alone was enough to tell anyone that the boys had been very worried- which, as anyone who knew Phineas and Ferb was aware, was exceedingly rare. They were usually so positive.

For a moment, none of them spoke, afraid to break the silence. But at last, Phineas sighed, seeming to acknowledge that someone had to finish the story.

"Well, Ferb and I wouldn't stand for it," he said simply, a determined edge to his voice. "I mean, no one messes with our platypus and gets away with it! So, to make a long story short, we got the idea to start this from the second dimension-" he swept an arm around to indicate the Rebellion, a slightly brighter smile beginning to return to his features- "-and here we are today."

Perry contemplated the large number of tents he'd seen on the way in, suddenly realizing just how big the Rebellion's forces must have been. Knowing the boys, they had probably gotten the whole of Danville in on the rebellion, and despite the previously depressing circumstances, Perry could not resist a grin and that age-old question; "Aren't you a little young to start a revolution?"

Phineas grinned, seeming rather amused. "No," he answered cheerfully, his voice a little softer than usual. "No, we're not."

Perry smiled and took the opportunity to look over them once more, realizing for what must have been the umpteenth time just how much the two of them had grown. Phineas' hair still stuck out like some sort of palm tree on the top of his head, and his face still held that somewhat childlike quality that Perry had always known; but there was also something more mature about it. His eyes carried some kind of quality that showed not only their usual cheery twinkle, but also something akin to experience; it was the kind of look that made you feel as if he'd been through an awful lot in his relatively short lifetime.

Ferb was about the same; his hair was a little longer than before, perhaps, but it was as green as ever and still rather sprout-like. His visage, though as blank as it had always been, betrayed some sort of wisdom that seemed to emanate from him in an almost palpable sense. Perry could not even begin to imagine what Ferb's intellect amounted to now, considering how advanced it had been even as a ten-year-old.

Both of them had grown taller, even taller than Candace- although that could have been due to the size of their heads, which hadn't changed one bit and still seemed a bit too big for their bodies. The tight black rebel uniforms they wore showed that they were rather lean and in excellent shape- which you had to expect from teenage rebel fighters, Perry supposed. All in all, his boys were no longer the children they had once been. Like Candace, they had changed so much; and yet, they were just the same.

Meanwhile, just as Perry finished reexamining the boys, Phineas sat back comfortably and gave him an expectant glance. "So, Perry," he said amiably, propping his chin up on his hands, "now that you've heard our side of the story, I think we'd all like to hear yours."

Perry sighed lightly, gathered his thoughts, and prepared to explain. "Well," he began pensively, "I guess it all started with a time machine…"

* * *

><p>Five minutes later found the three of them still sitting in the tent, Perry having just finished an explanation of what happened to him and where he had been, which interested the boys greatly. They were an excellent audience, too- it seemed they always knew exactly when to listen intently and when to speak up, when to commend him for a brave or clever deed and when to gasp in shock. When Perry told them about the car chase, they both seemed amazed and terrified at the same time, probably still fretting for their pet's safety. And when he explained how they had found Perry's secret base- or what used to be the secret base- Phineas swelled quietly with pride.<p>

"Did you like our little riddle? Clever, isn't it?" he inquired cheerfully, showing neither boastfulness nor excess of pride in his voice. "When we said 'drop by the backyard', we were referring to the pitfall in the visitor's entrance. Ferb thought it up!" And Perry immediately agreed that it was very clever, and congratulated Ferb on his riddling skills.

The remainder of the story passed quickly, and when Perry had finished telling it, Phineas had to speak up. He and Ferb had been particularly quiet when Perry told them of his visit with Candace, and it wasn't hard to see that they both looked rather downhearted and a little guilty. When he spoke, it was quite clear that Phineas had some regrets when it came to his sister.

"So, about Candace…she's not angry with us, is she?" he asked quietly, seeming rather abashed.

Perry shook his head emphatically, trying to show that he was sincere. Judging by how much the boys loved their sister, they were probably feeling bad about going off to start a rebellion without telling her anything of their whereabouts. "No, no, she's just very worried about you," he assured the redhead, adopting a comforting tone. "She didn't seem angry at all, not through the whole visit."

Phineas nodded, and he didn't say any more about the subject. Perhaps this was because he needed a bit more time to reflect on it, or because he didn't want to break down again after such a teary reunion just a short while before. Whatever the reason, Perry felt no need to press the topic.

Clearing his throat, Phineas tried to erase the uncomfortable atmosphere the talk had created, and piped up once more. "Oh, Perry, I nearly forgot to ask," he said, his cheerful tone returning. It didn't cover his anxiety entirely, but you could tell that he was trying hard. "Is that a translator?"

Perry laughed and grinned playfully. "No, I was magically given the ability to speak with the power of rainbows. Why else would I be speaking English?"

Ferb collapsed into giggles again, and Phineas burst into genuine laughter along with him. Their laughter continued for a few moments, dying down gradually, and when they were calm enough, Perry felt he had to explain for real.

"Okay, all jokes aside, it's a translator," he told them, tapping the device perched on his hat. "Well, Translator-_Inator_, actually, but it's all the same."

Phineas nodded in understanding. "Neat!" he commented, seeming to approve of the device. Then he remarked, "Personally, Ferb and I prefer the Universal Moustache Translator. Right, Ferb?"

Behind him, Ferb pulled a thin, black handlebar moustache from his pocket and attached it to his upper lip, then gave the thumbs up with an energetic, "MEEP!"

Phineas laughed once more at that, amused by his brother's antics. "Oh, by the way, your voice sounds really cool, too," he complimented Perry. "It suits you!"

Feeling rather flattered, Perry grinned. "It is pretty cool, isn't it?" Feeling he couldn't take much credit for it, he hastily explained. "I didn't come up with it, though. It was already programmed into the device." Then he paused, shaking his head in disbelief. "But, y'know, I'm still bewildered by this- is Carl the _only _one here who noticed the talking thing right away?"

Phineas shrugged. "Oh, we noticed," he said passively. "We just didn't think much of it." Then he paused, snickering quietly, and remarked, "Besides, with all the stuff that happens to us, rainbow magic seemed pretty likely to me."

This resulted in another bout of giggles from all three of them, which subsided quickly. Once they were all a little calmer, Phineas stretched with a loud yawn and jumped up, emulated quickly by Ferb.

"Hey, Perry, I just got a great idea!" he exclaimed. "It's almost four-o-clock, and you've hardly seen any of the camp. Why don't Ferb and I take you on a tour?" And he offered his hand to Perry to help him up.

Perry, of course, took but a moment to consider this and nodded with a smile. "Sure!" And he allowed Phineas to help him up, then followed both of them out of the tent.

As they exited into the waiting room, the people sitting within instantly stood up and saluted the boys, who saluted back crisply. Perry couldn't help but feel a small urge to salute as well; the majority of the time, it was him doing it, not the boys.

"Hey, guys!" Phineas greeted them cheerfully, wearing a bright grin. "Guess what?"

The room was silent; it appeared no one had a reasonable guess. Eventually, someone in the corner ventured hesitantly, "What?"

Phineas' grin, if at all possible, got even wider. "Today, my good friends, is a day for celebration- Perry's back, alive and well!"

Of course, no one seemed to know immediately who Perry was, but Phineas' excitement was enough to make them smile and congratulate him, all the time casting curious looks at the platypus by their feet. Phineas could hardly hold his anticipation in.

"I know, right? This is great!" he exclaimed enthusiastically. "We should have some kind of party! Everybody go spread the word!"

The rebels looked slightly confused, but a party, no matter what its purpose might be, was always good. Without further ado, they left the room quickly, rushing out through the automatic doors to the camp beyond to spread the news. Phineas and Ferb followed them outside, Perry keeping close to them, and began to stroll down the path that Carl had taken him down when he first arrived at the camp.

"They're great," Phineas murmured to himself, smiling gratefully at his soldiers' eagerness to obey their leaders. He took a quick glance back at Perry and chirped, "Okay, first stop on our tour is the troops! Most of them come from Danville, because they're fed up with LOVE MUFFIN, but some have even come from other states and stuff! Ferb and I feel very lucky to have such a great bunch of people helping us out." As he talked, he took a right turn through a few tents, gesturing amiably for Ferb and Perry to follow. "Come on, the training grounds are this way!"

The walk to the training grounds was short, and they reached the area quite soon. It was a clearing in the sea of tents, an open grassy field that was occupied only by a few stray birds and several groups of people who were standing in formation, practicing various military techniques. Leading each of them was a man or woman calling out orders, and they all seemed to be doing well. Upon seeing the groups, Phineas grinned proudly.

"Behold!" he called, sweeping an arm out grandly. "The real force behind the Rebellion!"

Perry took in the scene with a sense of awe, amazed that Phineas and Ferb could get such a thing organized practically by themselves, probably even before they had reached fourteen. He glanced up at them, wearing a very impressed smile.

"Wow," was all he could really think to say. Then, with a playful smile, he added, "Are you sure you're not too young to command this whole thing?"

Phineas seemed to take that a little more seriously than Perry had meant. "I don't _think _so…" he pondered thoughtfully. "So far, everybody's been telling us we're doing good. What do you think?"

Perry immediately told them he thought they were doing great, from what he'd seen, and Phineas' grin returned in full strength.

"But really, how long have you guys been running this?" Perry asked curiously, taking in the sheer number of tents that surrounded the spacious training ground (or what he could see from his diminutive height, anyway).

Phineas took a moment to consider, placing a hand on his chin in pensive contemplation. "Hmm," he murmured uncertainly, narrowing his eyes in thought. At length, he turned to Ferb and said, "What do you think, bro?"

Ferb, by way of reply, held up a hand displaying five outstretched fingers. Phineas nodded in understanding, his face brightening again, and turned back to Perry. "Ferb says about five years now," he confided pleasantly, not at all fazed by the extensive time he and Ferb had served as leaders of the rebellion. Perry, on the contrary, was clearly amazed.

"That long?" he exclaimed, utterly blown away. But as soon as the words left him, he made a hasty amendment. "I-I mean, I know I should come to expect this kind of thing from you two, especially now that you're older…but, still-!" He paused, struggled for the right words to explain himself for a moment, and finally said, "Five years is an awfully long time, you know? And no matter what you guys build, it just never seems to last longer than a day…"

Clearly amused by this, Phineas began to laugh good-naturedly again. Beside him, Ferb remained quite placid, but a small smile graced his lips. Perry just shrugged pointedly, although a smile had taken root on his face as well.

"What?" he protested, still smiling playfully. "It does!"

Phineas almost replied, but seemed to decide against it, and his laughter gradually tapered away until it had subsided. "Well, as true as that used to be," he finally replied, still with a hint of a giggle in his voice, "we actually haven't been running it _entirely _alone…"

Perry blinked, taking that into consideration. _Well, _he thought, _they probably have advisors or something. They are just teenagers, after all; someone more experienced has to be there to give good judgment and advice or something._

Just then, in the midst of his thoughts, Phineas spoke again. "We've actually had a lot of help from some people who know a lot about large organizations, especially military-type ones that fight evil. Oh! And look-" he perked up, pointing a short ways across the field at a pair of approaching figures, and chirped, "-here they come now!"

Interested to know who had been helping the boys run such an organization, Perry tore himself away from his thoughts and looked up at the figures, whom he recognized immediately with hardly any surprise- Major Monogram and Carl, who must have come to help the boys when the rebellion was started.

"Good afternoon, boys," greeted Major Monogram stiffly, saluting the boys as he approached. Then he smiled down at Perry, who was standing by their feet, and commented, "And to you too, Agent P. Good to have you back!"

Perry saluted crisply out of habit, and replied, "Hello, sir. It's good to _be _back."

Behind the major, Carl waved and called, "Hi, Agent P! I see you've met our fearless leaders."

Perry nodded hesitantly. "I have…although," he said, raising an eyebrow inquisitively, "I don't remember you saying anything about these leaders being Phineas and Ferb."

Monogram shrugged passively, wearing a slightly mischievous grin. "Well, I did say they knew where your owners were. You have to admit, that part was true."

Perry just rolled his eyes with a grudging half-smile; after working for the Agency for nearly all his life, he was quite used to Monogram and Carl's occasional pranks and joking ways.

Phineas, who had been respectfully quiet throughout this short exchange, spoke up again with a bright tone. "Major Monogram has been helping us run the Rebellion military-wise," he explained cheerily, acknowledging this with a grateful smile. "And Carl has been helping with….other things."

"I always get stuck with bills and laundry and stuff," Carl complained half-heartedly. "It's not much different from being an intern, though."

"That's true- after the OWCA, this isn't much different," Monogram concurred, his usual serious demeanor returning. "Except no one here is an animal- well, besides you, Agent P." Then he paused, acquiring a slightly troubled frown. "And now, even you can talk with that translator gadget…" He trailed off sadly, as if he missed the old days when Perry only expressed himself with scathing glares and raised eyebrows.

Perry shrugged. Personally, he couldn't help but feel quite indifferent toward the whole matter. "Well, I have to communicate _somehow_," he pointed out. "Writing notes took too long. And besides, it's kind of necessary for the plot."

Instantly, a rather awkward silence fell over the training ground. Even the soldiers who were drilling in the field stopped in their tracks, glanced over at where Perry and the boys stood, and raised their eyebrows questioningly. Phineas, for once, was silent, and Major Monogram and Carl merely stared at Perry as if he'd just claimed to be king of the martians.

Unnerved, Perry shrank slightly under the sudden attention, gaining a small and somewhat shy frown. "Was it something I said?" he asked meekly.

At last, the silence was broken by Ferb. "Well, you've just broken the fourth wall again," he pointed out placidly.

Perry was silent for a moment more, seeming slightly confused, before Phineas cleared his throat and spoke up. "Hey, I've got an idea," he said, a slightly awkward note in his voice. "Let's go show Perry all our new technology, shall we, Ferb?"

"Sounds delightful," Ferb agreed, calm as ever in the face of fourth-wall breaking.

Then they bid the major and Carl goodbye and set off for the next stop on the tour, all very glad to be free of such an uncomfortable situation.

* * *

><p>A few minutes later, Phineas and Ferb had led Perry to a large, well-lit tent with a wide floor plan and laboratory equipment spread throughout. It seemed that no matter where they turned, someone was diligently bent over some machine or formula, or scribbling notes on a clipboard, or testing something. Perry could not help but marvel at the various kinds of technology, the likes of which were unheard of in his own time- possibly even surpassing Phineas and Ferb's usual standards. But, although he could tell that it was incredibly advanced, Perry still had to admit; he still had no idea what any of it was.<p>

Feeling a bit overwhelmed, he tapped Phineas' leg to get his attention and earned a quick glance from the boy. "Phineas," he asked curiously, "what are all these things?"

Phineas was eager to explain. "Let me show you!" he chirped happily, and he immediately dashed over to an unattended table and scooped up a device. Holding it out to Perry, he allowed the secret agent to examine the gadget, which appeared to be a ray gun. It was a dark purple color with silver accents, and it featured what looked like a satellite dish on the end. Perry could tell immediately that it could not be a normal gun, because there was no visible cylinder for the bullets. This meant it was definitely a laser gun, as he would have expected anyway- but its purpose was still a mystery.

Thankfully, Phineas was also keen to explain the device. "This," he said proudly, holding it high for effect, "is our answer to ray gun combat. I give you, the Sonic Pulse Gun!"

Perry raised his eyebrows appreciatively, which prompted Phineas to explain further. "Its primary function is to release a concentrated blast of sonic energy that knocks people backwards. It can either catapult you back with a huge amount of energy, or just create a weak force field to repel people and objects slowly." He quickly demonstrated this by toggling a few controls and holding a button down on the back of the grip, which caused the device to click quietly. There was no visible effect for a moment- but before long, Perry began to feel a strange, almost magnetic force pushing at him, slowly but surely pushing him away from where Phineas stood. Beside him, the same appeared to be happening to Ferb- he was gradually sliding across the floor in the direction of the table, which he bumped into presently. Upon seeing this, Phineas giggled quietly and turned the device off, effectively cutting off the signal.

Then he explained further. "You see, Ferb and I have never been big on violence," he stated, although Perry had already known this (and wondered about in the back of his mind). "So we figured it'd be easier to just repel people- without actually having to attack them! Useful, eh?" He grinned, obviously pleased by this. However, Perry raised an eyebrow in a vaguely critical way.

"But, Phineas," he reasoned, "what do you do if you need to defend yourself? You guys are fighting in a revolution; sooner or later, you really will have to fight, whether you do so in a violent way or not. It's kind of inevitable."

Phineas smiled. "I don't see many ways for fighting _not _to be violent…but we've thought of that."

In response, Perry's expression returned to normal, and he smiled. Of course they'd thought of it; the way he knew Phineas and Ferb, they would never overlook anything as important as this. He'd have to remember to expect this sort of thing.

"Anyway," Phineas continued steadily, "The SPG actually has several different functions; it can also utilize a ray that neutralizes nervous responses for a while to render the victim paralyzed, a blast that induces total unconsciousness, and a befuddling beam that confuses the senses for an hour or so." Having finished explaining the device's functions, Phineas set it down on the table he had taken it from and grinned. "Pretty good, huh?"

Perry nodded in approval. "I should have known you guys wouldn't miss a thing," he concurred with a smile. "So, it doesn't permanently damage anything?"

Phineas thought for a moment, then raised an eyebrow. "Well, mostly- but ever since Kenny offered to test the befuddling beam, he's been calling us 'potatoes' and claiming that we shouldn't dance, or we'll die."

"And when did he test it…?" Perry prompted, a little unsettled now.

Phineas grimaced uncomfortably. "Erm…last year or so…"

They were all quiet for a few seconds, during which Perry discreetly moved away from the table. At length, Phineas cleared his throat. "Let's move on, shall we…" he said awkwardly, and he quickly led the group off to another table.

"Over here, we have another important invention," said the cheerful redhead, gesturing to another table. This one was painted black and sported a thick, steady frame, but it did not appear to have anything resting on the clear surface; that is, until Phineas pressed a button on the side.

Instantly, a neon-green hologram sprung forth from the table, taking the same shape of the holographic Danville Perry had seen in Phineas and Ferb's tent. Perry understood this one almost immediately- it was some kind of 3D map, probably used for making battle plans as he had seen the boys doing. Phineas, of course, still felt the need to elaborate.

"This is our holographic map table," he explained happily, face illuminated brightly by the green glow. "We use it for tracking enemy troops and bases, and for keeping track of our own. It's useful for when you need to see an accurate map of Danville, or when you need to make battle plans. We have several of these things scattered throughout the camp, so you can access a map anytime you like."

As he spoke, he indicated a few markers placed throughout the map, and quickly disclosed what they were. "These markers tell us where everything is. The square is the enemy base, triangles are enemy troops, and home is where the heart is." And he pointed to a heart-shaped marker some ways away from Danville, outside the city limits. Perry couldn't help but giggle a little at his pun as Phineas turned off the map and swept them away to another table.

"Here we have something really important- our special force-field armor," said Phineas as they reached another table, upon which a few cardboard boxes rested. The boxes were filled with black clothes with grooves sewn into the fabric, the same kind the rebel fighters wore. Phineas took a shirt out of a box marked '_medium_' and held it up, displaying the grooves that ran from the shoulders to around the three-quarters mark, and all down the chest of the shirt.

"This special suit, as you can see, is made to go underneath the actual armor," said Phineas, indicating the identical shirt he was wearing. Then he crossed to a table across the way, picked up a chest plate that was resting there, and put it on overtop of the suit. It almost looked like what Perry had seen the soldiers wearing when he and Doofenshmirtz discovered the rebellion, but it lacked extra pieces of armor on the arms and torso.

"The armor fits overtop of the suit and locks into the grooves," Phineas continued, demonstrating this as he spoke, "so that it fits just right and won't fall off accidentally. Then, you press this button-" he pressed a button on the left side of the chest plate- "and it activates a sequence where new pieces of armor slide out along the grooves built into the suit. This creates a set of full body armor, both lightweight and flexible!" As he spoke, exactly this was occurring; small plates of armor slid out along the arms and torso of the suit, apparently stored within the original chest plate. As Phineas had said, it created a set of full body armor that clearly was not weighing the boy down or restricting his movement, as he could swing his arms about freely. Thoroughly impressed, Perry's eyes went very wide.

"You guys, this…this is really incredible," he praised, his tone showing a clear amazement. Phineas beamed, then pressed the button once more. Instantly, the armor retracted into the original piece, there was a clicking noise as the mechanism unlocked itself, and Phineas lifted the chest plate off over his head with ease.

"Actually, it's not much different from the armor Ferb and I used for the Beak," he said casually, returning the armor and extra shirt to their rightful places. "After all, if it worked for _one_ vigilante fighter, why not for a whole group of them? And sure enough, it's working great."

As he spoke, he began to lead them away from the table towards the exit of the tent, clearly finished with the technology. However, as they were exiting, Perry couldn't help but notice another section of the room that was surrounded by a curtain, obscuring whatever was inside from view. As he watched it, one of the scientists he had seen walked over to the curtain discreetly and pulled part of it aside so he could come through, and Perry had a brief but clear view inside the tent. Inside, he saw what looked like a large, heavy laser gun, obviously created with very advanced technology, resting on a table and apparently still under construction.

He wondered briefly what it was, but just then there came a call from a short ways away. "Per-ry! Are you coming? I'm not gonna hold this door forever!"

Perry turned to see where it had come from and saw Phineas standing by the exit, one hand resting on the automatic door with a playful grin. Then he glanced back at the curtain, only to see that it had swung back into place by now and his view was once again obscured. He stared after it for a moment, then decided to catch up with Phineas and Ferb.

He dashed up to the boys, who were waiting patiently by the door, and followed them outside. As they went, curiosity got the better of him, and he inquired, "Hey, Phineas…what was that blocked off room in there?"

Phineas, it seemed, was about to reply- but just then, the sound of a very loud bell ringing filled the camp, and he perked up.

"That's the dinner bell," he explained, and he pointed into the distance, where, if you looked hard enough, you could see a large metal triangle being struck. "I guess we'd better get over to the mess hall." He began to rush off in the direction of the bell, then turned back to make sure the other two were following. "Oh, and sorry, Perry…I think it'll have to wait for now. But I swear we'll explain soon!"

With that, he rushed off to the mess hall with Ferb hot on his heels. Perry sighed, slightly disappointed, but dashed after them anyway. The mystery device, it seemed, was to remain a mystery for the moment.

* * *

><p>Dinner was far different than Perry had expected, for several reasons.<p>

For one, the mess hall wasn't indoors like he had assumed; it was outdoors under the late afternoon sky, located in a large field with tables everywhere.

For two, the place was _huge_- the entire army, it seemed, could fit in the field and not even have to squeeze in (the boys really amazed Perry sometimes).

And for a third thing, the food was not anything like you'd normally find in an army- no, not with Phineas and Ferb leading it. They had a ready-made meal for everyone, with an ample amount of food for each soldier. And it was good- somehow, the boys had ordered Chinese that night, fortune cookies and all. Upon asking the boys about how they had obtained such food while camping outside of Danville (not to mention obtaining enough to feed an army), the boys merely answered that they had been saving their allowance for so long, they hardly knew what to do with it anymore. As for where they had gotten it, Phineas was happy to confide that they had quite a few sympathizers who were happy to help feed their army and send various supplies to them. Not everyone, Phineas said, could join the Rebellion itself and fight alongside them, but they could do their own parts. This impressed Perry quite considerably; for despite the fact that the boys were running a rebellion, they still seemed to be living a somewhat normal life.

But in the back of his mind, he wondered how long it could last…

After dinner, things became a blur for Perry. The boys, for one, felt they had to show him just a few more things around camp, which took an hour or so. And after that, Major Monogram wanted to introduce him to the troops. Perry felt quite flattered as the major explained proudly that Agent P was the OWCA's best agent, and maybe if the soldiers were lucky, he'd show them a thing or two. This was met with many awed stares and a few handshakes, after which Perry was finally allowed to retire with the boys in their private tent.

The boys' tent had a main room which housed their holographic map table, where they were allowed to do whatever they wished if they had any spare time. Connected to that by automatic doors were two more rooms- a bedroom and a washroom.

The bedroom, as Perry could have predicted, was covered in various things the boys had collected while leading the rebellion, and a few that it seemed they had brought from home. Two sets of armor hung on hooks by the door, along with two jackets (Mom would surely have had a fit if they left without them), and a lightweight bookcase rested by the wall, containing a small amount of books. The walls of the tent were blue to match their old room, and like their old room, there were many designs on the ceiling. Gone were the bright, happy clouds of their youth, replaced by many stars and constellations over a dark blue sky. The sleeping bags on the floor were comfortable-looking with soft pillows, and there was certainly enough room for a platypus to sneak under the occupant's arm for the night.

But this was precisely the issue that troubled Perry. While the boys finished their bedtime preparations, he waited by the sleeping bags, wondering tentatively where he would sleep. As he fell into a sitting position in his berth, Phineas seemed to notice his pet's uncomfortable posture, and a frown of confusion crossed his face.

"Hey, Perry," he appealed softly, "is something wrong?"

Perry shrugged, not sure the issue was really worth bringing up. "I just…well, I'm not quite sure," he said, with an awkward glance at his feet. "But, it's…not important, I guess."

Phineas watched him for a moment more, keeping absolutely silent. At length, he sighed heavily. "Y'know, Perry, I'm not feeling so great either…can I talk to you and Ferb?"

Perry looked up immediately, alert and ready to listen. He was very good at it, after all. "Of course, Phin."

Phineas seemed slightly downhearted now. He was quiet for a moment, and when he spoke, it was with a hesitant air. "I was thinking…about Candace."

"Oh…" Perry understood immediately. Phineas had probably been thinking about his sister all day, trying to come to terms with himself on the ethics of leaving her behind all those years ago. Now, he just needed someone to talk to about it.

"…I've been thinking about her all day, trying to come to terms with myself on the ethics of leaving her behind," Phineas echoed. "Now I just need someone to talk to about it."

Abruptly, he blinked in sudden realization. "Whoa, _major _déjà vu."

Perry raised an eyebrow. "What are you, psychic? I was just thinking that…"

Just then, Ferb cleared his throat loudly from the other sleeping bag.

Phineas gave a start at the sound. "Oh, right- Candace." Then he gathered his thoughts with a quick breath, and began to talk. "Well, after you told us about her, Perry, I just couldn't help but feel terrible about leaving and not telling her where we went."

His gaze was fixed on the floor, and his brow was knit as he spoke. "You said she…really missed us…and that she thought it was her fault."

Perry, who was also feeling rather regretful for upsetting Candace so, did not quite know how to respond. When one lives a silent life, one does not have much experience in comforting others. At length, he responded tentatively, "Well, Candace is sort of neurotic, you know. She tends to think everything is her fault."

"But it wasn't, and she thinks it is," Phineas said in a despondent tone. "When we left, we knew it would be dangerous to start a rebellion. Neither I nor Ferb wanted to get her caught up in something that could be potentially life-threatening- after all the close calls we've had before, we didn't want to take any more chances. But I'm beginning to wonder…if we made the right choice."

He shook his head, looking frustrated, and muttered, "I don't think we did."

When he looked back up, there was a new wave of sadness washing over his features. "Our spies have been keeping an eye on her, so we know she's happy with Jeremy…but for a long time we just didn't think it was safe to make contact. Then, just recently, we tried to visit her…"

He paused for a moment, and Perry got the feeling that he was reminiscing about the visit. After a moment, he asked, "And, how did that go?"

Phineas closed his eyes briefly, speaking without looking at his listener. "…Bad. Ferb and I had a great plan- we went in disguise, using holographic modules, but they didn't work as well as we thought. See, it was raining that day…"

He didn't need to explain; Perry could practically see the scene unfolding in his mind. At the mention of holographic disguise modules, he immediately pictured a Disguise-Inator perched on each boy's ear, probably getting soaked by the rain and malfunctioning. The hologram would then disappear, rendering them vulnerable.

"We were caught by LOVE MUFFIN patrols," Phineas explained ruefully, "and though we managed to fend them off, we haven't gone back since. If anything should happen, we can't very well get caught- our troops need us."

Here, he opened his eyes once more, and Perry could see that the dark blue irises were filled with regret. "Perry," he asked sadly, "have you ever made a bad choice and tried to fix it, but only wound up making things worse?"

Perry was quiet for a moment, during which he scoured his memory for such an event. He closed his eyes and put one hand on his chin in deep thought, frowning in a pensive manner. Phineas saw the slightly frustrated expression, and he knew that Perry had come up empty-handed.

"That's okay," he assured his pet, trying to smile like he usually did. "I didn't think so. But trust me, it's not a fun feeling."

Perry sighed, feeling sorry that he could not help his owner. Eventually, he spoke again, trying to comfort the two of them. "Phineas, Ferb…I'm so sorry about all this…"

Phineas' expression turned just the tiniest bit stern. "Perry," he said, his voice matching the expression perfectly, "You can't possibly blame yourself for this, too."

Perry shrugged downheartedly. "I don't know, Phin; the more I think about it, the easier it is."

Then, in the nick of time, Ferb spoke up. "Well, no matter what happens," he announced calmly, "These things have a way of working themselves out."

Phineas cracked a wan smile. "Ferb's right, things will get better soon. Then we can see Candace again, and fix this future- or at least, I hope so. I'm getting sick of sleeping in a tent, instead of in a house with my family."

Perry was quiet for a moment. Presently, a weak smile stretched across his features, and Phineas mirrored it, fears appeased for the moment. Then he yawned and stretched widely, clearly getting tired.

"Well," he said in a sleepy voice, "is everyone ready for bed?"

Perry was silent, expecting that he was talking to Ferb. Ferb, naturally, gave no response other than a thumbs up. Phineas smiled and nodded, then turned to Perry. "What about you, boy?"

Perry nodded as well, a small frown now resting on his features. "Um, actually," he spoke up quietly, "I've been wondering about-"

Phineas didn't seem to hear him; he just laid down and clapped twice, and the lights turned off. Perry was left in the dark, sitting on the end of Phineas' sleeping bag and wondering what he was to do. After a lot of waiting, Phineas seemed to notice something was wrong.

"Perry?" his voice came through the near-blackness, sounding confused. Perry responded with a quick chirp from the end of the bed, and Phineas said, "You gonna sleep down there, boy?"

Perry was quiet for a moment. Then, just when it seemed he might not respond at all, he said awkwardly, "Well, I've been thinking…if you guys know my secret, won't it be a little…I don't know…" he paused briefly, then concluded, "…awkward?"

Phineas responded with a tired laugh. "Perry," he said, his voice calm and soothing, "It's not awkward at all; Ferb and I have missed this for years. We don't mind you're wearing a hat and talking, do we, Ferb?"

In the other bed, a soft _ding _could be heard.

You could practically hear the smile in Phineas' voice, even if you couldn't see it. "See, it's not a problem. And besides, it would make me feel a lot better…"

Perry stared into the blackness for a few seconds, eyes wide to try and see his owner. At length, he smiled, and reached up to take the hat off. There was a quiet _click_ as he shut off the Translator-Inator, and then a soft _thump _as the hat landed on the floor of the tent. A gratified purr filled the tent as Perry found his way to Phineas, who draped an arm over him affectionately. The platypus soon let his eyes drift closed, and before he knew it, the lullaby of Phineas' soft breathing carried him into sleep.

Phineas smiled, stroking the soft teal fur as if he was petting an ordinary housecat. "Good night, Perry…"

And a heartbeat later, Perry was snoring softly.

For a few moments, Phineas tried to fall asleep as well- but at last, he felt he had to say what was on his mind.

"…Ferb."

Ferb opened one eye silently, and although Phineas could hardly see him, he knew that his brother was listening. "Ferb, I've been thinking," he whispered, "about the plan…"

Ferb nodded.

"Now that we know what happened…we can fix it. We can fix everything."

A soft, "Mm," of agreement.

Phineas grinned, a stray moonbeam glinting off of his sparkling eyes. "I know what we're going to do tomorrow."

_To be continued…_

* * *

><p><strong>End Notes: <strong>So, it seems the boys actually remember the best day ever! Isn't that a shocker! :) And we still don't get to see what happened to Doof, but don't fret- he comes back in chapter thirteen to annoy everyone. xD

Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter! :D


	12. The Plan to End All Plans

**Author's Notes: **Heaviest edits are at the end, where I wanted to fix up Phineas and Perry's little conversation. I added some things that, I think, made it a lot more believable. :3

/edit

TAKE OUT PANCAAAAKES

I WANT THEM :P

I don't know whether such a thing really exists, but you'll get it when you read the chapter. ^-^ Aside from that, I really only have a few things to say.

Sono-ichi: This one has a little Phinbella in it. It was mentioned in the last chapter, too, so if you don't like that pairing, my sincere apologies. But it's not the whole focus of the story, so I hope anyone who doesn't support the pairing won't mind.

Sono-ni: Doof still hasn't come in, since the chapter would have been too long if he did. But he'll be in chapter thirteen, I swear! :)

Sono-san: I like Japanese numbers. XD

Enjoy the chapter!

* * *

><p>It was a clear summer morning in the Tri-State Area, filled with birdsong and gently ending dreams. A crisp breeze was blowing in the cool summer weather, balancing the warm rays of sunlight with a gentle wind, and throughout the Rebellion camp, a rare sense of peace was draped over the solar-powered tents. It seemed that the pressure of the military camp had evaporated, just like the morning dew was starting to do.<p>

And to complete the peaceful atmosphere, if you listened carefully, you could hear soft snoring coming from inside one of the tents. The sound was coming from the tent's sole occupant- a peacefully sleeping, comfortably curled up Perry, enjoying his last moments of rest on Ferb's sleeping bag. Ferb himself had gotten up already (the boys had always been especially early risers), so Perry was alone, but he didn't mind- in fact, he was too tired to notice. Rest, for him, was getting rarer these days, and he felt he had to savor every moment he got. So at the moment, that was what he was doing.

But not for long.

For at that moment, if you'd been minding the time, you could see that it had just struck seven-thirty. Instantly, almost as soon as the second hand had clicked into the twelve-o-clock position, a loud bugle rang out across the camp, blasting out the tune of 'Reverie'. People everywhere stirred instantly, awakened by the loud music, and others began to come out of their tents to get breakfast. The Rebellion was awake, and ready for duty.

Perry, however, was far from it. For a moment or two, as the screechy bugler continued his call, he tried to ignore it. His mind snapped into focus, but his body wouldn't cooperate, and instead of getting up, he merely curled himself tighter. Eyes squeezed tight, he tried to ignore the persistent rays of sunlight that were peeking in through the tent window and attempted to fall asleep again, feeling that it had been hardly any time at all since he fell to rest beside Phineas that night. Just a moment more was all he needed, or so he told himself…

"Psst, Ferb. You know what I just remembered?"

Perry pricked up his ears at this- it was unmistakably Phineas' voice, which sounded sort of far away but seemed to be getting closer. Despite his sleepy state, he couldn't help but listen in.

Ferb had clearly responded with a gesture of some sort, because Phineas continued in a slightly hushed voice. "While we were listening to the wake up call, I thought of Grandpa Clyde. You remember how he used to wake us up whenever we went to camp?"

There came a quiet outbreak of snickering from the map room, which obviously was coming from the boys. "It sounded like a cat," Phineas giggled. "A cat being strangled."

"I wonder if our bugler learned to play from him," Ferb's calm British voice chimed in. Phineas giggled some more, his voice getting closer. He had probably already come into the tent, and by the sound of it, he was already at the door to the bedroom.

A moment later, Phineas' voice sounded again, this time right outside the door. "C'mon, Ferb, let's see if Mr. Sleepyhead's awake yet."

With a click and a metallic sliding noise, the automatic door opened smoothly, and Phineas and Ferb stepped into the room. Their shoes made only soft noises as they approached the bed, and Perry heard them both sit down next to him. Phineas began to pet his fur softly with long, gentle strokes. Perry remained curled up, but he did open one eye lazily, and gave a little chirp to demonstrate that he had indeed woken up. Above him, Phineas grinned.

"Good morning, Perry," he greeted, his voice a little softer than usual. "Did you sleep well?"

Perry just chattered sleepily in response, but it was enough for Phineas. "I should think so," the boy responded, "after the day you had yesterday. Car chases, long, emotional reunions, and then the whole tour…you must have been wiped out."

Perry made no response of the vocal kind (he had taken off the Translator-Inator for the night), instead choosing to get up and stretch luxuriously. Phineas did the same, stretching his skinny, noodle-like arms before him as far as they would go, and Ferb yawned loudly; clearly, the boys hadn't been up for long, either. Once they had all finished stretching, Phineas yawned briefly and stood up.

"Well, Ferb and I have been talking about what we should do today," he said, "Usually, we just run the camp, but what with you being here, we wanted to do something special. Then we met up with Baljeet and Buford, and they helped us plan something out. So, first off, we're going to meet them for breakfast- which should be commencing in just a moment. After that, we can catch up with the rest of the gang, and when we're done there, Ferb and I have something to show you."

He turned to Perry, who had just been reaching for his hat, and smiled. "How's that sound?"

Perry returned the smile as he adjusted his hat and the Translator-Inator, then replied happily, "Great. I'm starving…"

Phineas grinned, and behind him, Ferb rose and began to walk towards the door. "Well, not for long! Ferb and I managed to sneak in an order to Bob's Breakfast Buffet, and they were very supportive…" He grinned excitedly. "So, Perry, do platypuses like pancakes?"

* * *

><p>The walk to the mess hall (if you could even call it a hall) was short and leisurely, and the trio reached it soon. The tables were once again set up all over the clearing, and most of the rebels had assembled around them for breakfast. At the head of the field was a long table, loaded with bags of take-out food. This, upon closer inspection, proved to be the pancakes Phineas had spoken of earlier, and a few other things that he hadn't mentioned (Perry was beginning to realize that the boys' allowance must have been even more extensive than he had thought). Phineas and Perry chose a tall stack of pancakes for their breakfast, while Ferb took some French toast, and the three of them were about to leave for an empty table when something made Perry stop and sniff thoughtfully. He detected a robust, familiar smell in the air, accompanied by a bubbling noise that he knew all too well. He grinned and rushed off to get a cup- for what was breakfast without a large mug of coffee to wake him up?<p>

After Perry had retrieved his beloved coffee, he and the boys began to head off to find an empty table. The troops around them saluted as the boys passed, and although they couldn't very well return the gesture while carrying their food, they were happy to say good morning to everyone.

"Okay, now we just need to find a table…" Phineas murmured as they walked through the field. He glanced around, searching for an empty table for them to sit at. At first, there didn't seem to be one, until-

"Oh, Phineas! Over here, my friend!"

The high, Indian-accented voice brought Phineas' attention to the right side of the field, and he grinned. Perry couldn't see what he was looking at over the other tables, but he did recognize that voice- despite its being slightly lower (but not by much), it was unmistakably Baljeet's. Phineas beckoned to his companions cheerfully, and the three of them began to wind their way through the tables to the one their friend had called from.

Sure enough, when they reached the table, there was Baljeet, taller than last Perry had seen him and wearing a Rebellion uniform. His dark, curly hair was a little longer than usual, but he didn't seem to have changed much other than that, and he was grinning amiably. Beside him at the table was a teenage girl Perry didn't recognize. She had long, shiny black hair and a fair face, and the Rebellion uniform she wore complemented her slim figure perfectly. Next to her was Buford, who had also changed; he was now taller and even more thickset, and he seemed to have acquired a muscled build over the years. As usual, he was frowning, although he brightened a bit when he saw Phineas, Ferb, and Perry approaching.

"What's up, Dinner Bell?" he greeted Phineas as the three of them sat down at the table. Phineas quirked an eyebrow, confused but still smiling.

"Buford, we're eating _breakfast_," he said, with just a hint of humorous patronization in his voice. "That nickname really just doesn't work right now."

Buford snorted in irritation. "You know, I really wish you weren't wearing that uniform, so I could give you a wedgie."

"Going old school, are we, Buford?" the girl teased, causing the bully-turned-rebel to scowl in irritation. She then directed her attention to Phineas, smiling sweetly, and said, "So Phineas, whatcha doin'?"

Phineas did not answer immediately, and when he did, his cheeks were pinkish and his voice shook just the tiniest bit. "Oh, h-hi, Isabella."

Perry blinked. _Isabella? _There was simply no way; the teenager looked so different than the pink-clad little girl Perry had known eight years ago. Then she turned her head slightly, and he saw the familiar pink bow still perched on her head. He smiled to himself. Oh, yes- _that _was Isabella.

They were silent for a moment, Phineas wearing a dreamy smile. Eventually, Isabella raised an eyebrow in slight confusion and said, "Okay…so whatcha doin'?"

Phineas blinked, then shook himself and replied, "Oh, right! Um…y'know, we're just…uh…"

"We're about to eat breakfast," Perry responded for him, and Phineas responded with a brisk nod of agreement. Just then, Isabella noticed Perry, and her smile returned.

"Oh, there you are, Perry!" she said cheerfully. "Phineas filled us in already. Boy, if you weren't standing up and talking, I'd run right over there and scoop you up. We were all so worried about you; it's a huge relief just to see you alive!"

Perry tipped his hat respectfully, rather flushed. "It's great to see you three as well! I'm sorry I made everyone worry."

"Oh, that is okay. We are just thrilled to see you again!" Baljeet assured him, grinning happily. Perry returned the smile.

"So how are things at camp?" he asked casually.

"Oh, they are very good," Baljeet responded, but before he could elaborate, Buford cut in.

"Wow, Pointy was right- you _are _talkin'!" he exclaimed. After a pause, he added, "It's kinda weird."

Perry directed a quick glance skyward as he and the boys sat down. "Yeah, I get that a lot. But seriously, it's just a translator…what's so weird about that?"

"Cool voice, by the way," Isabella praised amiably, brushing a piece of hair out of her face (Perry noticed Phineas give a tiny, dreamy sigh).

"Where did you get such a device?" Baljeet asked as the boys began to eat.

"From my nemesis, actually," Perry explained, opening his take-out bag as he did so. "He was getting tired of taking notes. I can't believe that was only a few days ago…" He paused, absorbed in recollections of the past days and the enticing smell of pancakes wafting from the bag. However, when he looked back up, all three of the boys' friends had slightly uneasy expressions.

He looked from one to the other, raising an eyebrow. "What?"

Baljeet seemed about to speak up, but Buford cut him off once more. "Duh- you don't just take stuff from the enemy! Ya can't trust 'em!"

"They are very crafty," Baljeet warned, setting down his fork as he spoke.

"Once we found a broken device of theirs and took it back to camp," Isabella chimed in, a wary frown perched on her lips. "But when we reverse-engineered it out of curiosity, it turned out to be a tracker! Our whole operation would have been found out if Buford didn't happen to like smashing things so much."

Buford snickered to himself and started smashing little bits of waffle under his fork.

Perry did not quite know how to respond, but he did say, "Well, I wasn't going to keep writing notes for everything I wanted to say, it took too long. And besides, I'm fairly sure there's nothing wrong with this thing."

Baljeet scoffed, rolling his eyes. "Oh, of course you are sure! But it will not be too long before something terrible happens!"

Perry frowned, trying to ignore that and look on the bright side (not that he could find one). But there was an undeniable truth to their words that made him think for a moment. Surely Doofenshmirtz, of all people, could be trusted at least the smallest bit more than LOVE MUFFIN itself. After all, he _had _saved Perry's life a few times, and despite his moral obligation not to, Perry couldn't help but feel slightly grateful to the man. Of course, now that the issue of trust came up, it occurred to him that that might not be a good thing at all- what if Doofenshmirtz was just setting him up?

Just then, Baljeet interrupted his thoughts. "The point is that even the lowest member of their ranks cannot be trusted," the Indian teenager said darkly. "If there is anything we have learned in these eight years, it is that."

"Guys, guys," Phineas interrupted, having somewhat regained his composure by now. "I know we can't trust LOVE MUFFIN, but this is Dr. Doofenshmirtz we're talking about."

"How does that change anything?" Buford demanded roughly.

Phineas shrugged. "Well, first of all, we have him in custody now. And second of all…well, he's just not _smart _enough to hide a tracker in this thing."

There was a general murmuring of agreement from the group, and Ferb nodded solemnly. Perry could not help but smile to himself and hold in a giggle, for Phineas was exactly right.

"Besides," Phineas continued, all traces of his previous awkwardness now dispelled, "we're better protected now, so even if they did try something, they couldn't find us."

This piqued Perry's attention and brought to mind a question that he hadn't asked yet. "Oh, that reminds me, Phineas- how _have _you managed to stay hidden all this time, anyway?" he asked curiously. "LOVE MUFFIN is everywhere, you know. How come they haven't found you yet?"

"They almost did," said Phineas warily, staring into the middle distance with a reminiscent air. He did not hesitate to launch into explanation. "Ferb and I used to try to hide the camp in various places where we thought we wouldn't be found. It worked for a while, but then there was the incident with the tracker, and we decided that strategy wasn't working out for us." He paused and swept an arm around to indicate something, saying proudly, "So Ferb and I created this!"

There was a pause while Phineas stared up at the sky happily. Everyone else smiled and gazed around too, offering Phineas a few small compliments on how well-built it was. Perry just stared at the clouds passing overhead, wondering what on Earth he meant.

"Phineas," he said, with a slightly dubious tone, "I'm pretty sure you didn't make the sky."

That, of course, made the boy laugh, which everyone joined in on. Perry laughed too, but he still felt rather bewildered. Well, what were they pointing at, then, the sun? He was fairly sure that Phineas and Ferb hadn't created _that,_ either.

At length, Phineas' laughter died enough for him to explain. "No, Perry, I wasn't pointing at the sky," he explained cheerfully, still with a giggle or two. "I guess I could have made that clearer…well, anyway. This is our P and F Ultimate Protection Holographic Barrier!"

And he swept his arm around at the sky again, indicating that there was clearly some kind of device surrounding the camp, like a giant force field. Perry raised his eyebrows appreciatively, taking in the sheer size of this invisible barrier.

"Ohh," he said, understanding at last. "Well, that makes a lot more sense."

Phineas went on to explain that the PFUPHB, as Ferb was fond of abbreviating it, was an invisible force field that surrounded the camp. You could only see through it if you wore a special pair of glasses, which every rebel was equipped with, and it blocked all tracking signals known to Ferb. The barrier had been in place for several years, and so far, it had never failed them, so Phineas was happy to count it as a success.

"It's been in place for several years and so far, it's never failed us, so I'm happy to count it as a success," Phineas finished cheerfully.

Across the table, his friends raised their eyebrows suddenly.

"Whoa, déjà vu," Buford and Isabella chorused. Then Isabella shouted, "Jinx! You owe me a soda!"

For a while after that, everyone ate in silence, listening to the cheerful sounds of breakfast and early morning chatting all around them. Eventually, Isabella, who had finished her breakfast faster than the rest of the boys, spoke up.

"So Phineas, earlier you were saying something about…the plan." Her voice was low, almost a whisper, and she was obviously trying not to be heard by anyone else. Immediately, Baljeet and Buford glanced up from their breakfasts and began to pay closer attention to the redhead, while Ferb merely looked up with an attentive eye. Perry felt a rather odd sense of excitement that he couldn't quite place at the words, as if this 'plan' was something incredibly important.

They were silent for a moment. Phineas' head was down, so you couldn't see his expression, and it held some great sense of mystery and anticipation. At length, he responded with a single word. "Yup."

The table had fallen silent. Everyone was listening intently to Phineas, even their breath going quiet (except for Buford, who was absentmindedly chewing on a waffle). However, Phineas himself was still eating peacefully, as if nothing had happened. He did not speak again until he had finished his breakfast, and even then he merely grinned happily and said, "Well, I think we should show Perry around some more. We didn't have a whole lot of time last night, and there's still so much more of the camp to see!"

Isabella's face fell just the tiniest bit, but she seemed to agree nonetheless. "Okay, I guess…"

* * *

><p>After a while, Perry had seen almost every part of the Rebellion camp, which was very extensive. He had seen the tents with all their innovative designs, a few more obscure pieces of technology that the boys had forgotten before, the Fireside Girls (now known as the Fireside Elites), and the restroom ("Buford, I thought you used it <em>before <em>we left!"). He had also had the privilege to watch Ferb conduct a training session, which he and the rebel soldiers executed flawlessly. Phineas could not have been prouder of the troops, his friends, and his brother.

"Well, we've seen almost everything," he chatted amiably as he led them around a few more tents. "There's not much left…"

"There is still one thing," Baljeet prompted, his voice low and excited like Isabella's had been. "You have not shown him _the plan_ yet…"

Perhaps it was the emphasis Baljeet put on the words or perhaps Phineas just hadn't noticed before, but all the same, the mention of the plan got much more of a reaction out of the young leader this time. "Oh, of course!" he exclaimed happily, as if it was some kind of rollercoaster that they had not tried yet. Then his voice dropped low and quiet as he added in a dramatic tone, "The _plan!_"

Then he began to dash off down the path, followed quickly by Ferb. "C'mon, everybody, follow me!"

And, feeling rather flustered, they all attempted to do so as fast as they could.

* * *

><p>"It's in here! Keep up, guys!" Phineas called back excitedly as he sped into the technology tent, Ferb hot on his heels. Behind him, Isabella, Baljeet, Buford, and Perry were all trying to keep up with the energetic teenager as he bolted through the camp, each quite out of breath. But Phineas did not seem to notice as he sprinted into the tent and through the curtain Perry had seen the day before, Ferb remaining to hold it open for the other four. Isabella reached it first, dashing inside without a backwards glance. Baljeet came next, running as fast as he could to escape Buford, who merely seemed to enjoy chasing him. And behind them was Perry, who, despite being a very agile creature, had shorter legs than the rest and had to run for all he was worth to keep up. By the time he reached the door, he was thoroughly exhausted. Ferb noticed this as his tired pet dashed for the door, and he reached down to give him a quick pat before closing the curtain behind them.<p>

Perry came to a halt inside the blocked-off area and paused for breath, hands on his knees for support. Around him, through his own loud breathing, he could hear the others catching their breath, while Phineas chatted about 'the plan'. Other than that, he could hear electronic beeping, the sound of shoes on the tent floor, and a few people talking outside the curtain. At last, he felt he had recovered enough to look up.

The room around him wasn't much different than the laboratory tent that he had seen before- and it was now clear to him that it was the very room he had caught a glimpse of the previous day. The curtain had swung closed behind him, and the rest of the room was now blocked off, which gave him a rather strong sense of reversal. Of course, what really interested him was what was inside the room.

A single table was situated in the center of the room, surrounded by the boys and their friends, and on it sat what looked like a ray gun. Well, perhaps 'ray gun' wasn't the right word- it might have been closer to a machine gun. It was a little bigger than your average super soaker, and it consisted of two shiny metal cylinders, which were connected by a gray metal pipe, various wires, and a long handle with two grips, one in the front and one in the back. The front barrel had a clock face on it with the hands pointed precisely at midnight. It was large, but not so large that you couldn't hold it comfortably, and it had an air of being very heavy, very imposing, very powerful. Perry could not help but wonder what in the world it was.

Thankfully, Phineas loved explaining such things. You could tell that he was just bursting with anticipation from the way he was bouncing up and down lightly, and it was clear that they would all be getting an in-depth explanation soon.

Isabella, who had approached the table and was admiring the gun, had a rather awed expression. "Whoa," she said quietly, examining the complex machinery and thick outer metal. "So, this is…?"

"Oh, yeah," said Phineas, wearing a huge grin. "That's it. Do you like it?"

"It's so cool!" Isabella complimented glowingly, returning Phineas' excited smile.

"Yeah, we know it's cool," Buford spoke up from behind her, looking grumpy as usual. "But what is it?"

"Buford, do not be so belligerent. Were you not listening when we made the plan?" Baljeet scolded, approaching the table to have a look for himself. He whistled appreciatively. "By the way, the clock face is a nice touch, Phineas!"

"It was Ferb's idea," Phineas said, smiling proudly at his brother. Ferb, who was standing by the door behind Perry, merely gave a small smile and a thumbs up. Phineas then turned back to his friends, grinning happily. "Okay, I bet everybody wants to hear how the plan is going, right?"

Isabella, Baljeet, and Buford all gave a consensus of agreement, but behind them, Perry still didn't know what Phineas was talking about. He didn't know what the ray gun was or what it was supposed to do, and he didn't know what this plan was that Phineas was so excited over. Thankfully, the Translator-Inator was ready to ask those questions for him.

"Um, Phineas…?" he began to ask, but Phineas interrupted him excitedly.

"I've been looking forward to telling you this all day," he squeaked happily.

"Oh, boy," said Isabella, giving a small smile.

"Here it comes," said Buford, taking a seat on one of the chairs at the sides of the room. The others emulated him, each finding a seat as Phineas bounced from one foot to the other in anticipation.

Then, as soon as they were all settled, he launched into explanation without further ado. "The plan," he started dramatically, "is a scheme that I, Ferb, and our friends have crafted to overthrow the evil organization LOVE MUFFIN, which will involve high risks, ultimate sacrifice, and only the coolest intellectual minds available!"

"Selling it hard again," Isabella whispered to Baljeet, who tried to hide a small laugh.

"Yeah, yeah, we already know the plan," Buford spoke up irritably, crossing his arms. "Can't you just tell us about the machine?"

"Oh, _now _he knows about the plan," Baljeet muttered.

Phineas looked a little crestfallen. Then, gesturing at the patiently waiting Perry, he said, "Well…Perry doesn't know! So there."

"This is true," Perry pointed out, though he had a distinct notion that Phineas would also just like to go through the whole thing again. He didn't mind, though- in fact, it was sort of charming.

Buford grumbled a bit about having to listen to the whole spiel over again, but Isabella spoke up encouragingly. "Go on, Phineas! I'd like to hear it again!"

Phineas grinned eagerly. "Thanks, Isabella!" Then, getting down to business, he began to explain in earnest. "It goes like this," he began. "First, Ferb and I had to figure out what led to LOVE MUFFIN taking over. Well, clearly, it was the OWCA's job to stop them- but something went wrong with that. We didn't know what it was at the time, but we decided that if we could go back in time, we could figure out what the turning point was and change our future. So, we started work on this!" He waved toward the device on the table, proclaiming, "Behold! The Temporal Transmitter Ten-Thousand!"

There was silence for a moment while Phineas waited for them to be done beholding. In the quiet, Baljeet began to clap appreciatively, then realized no one was clapping with him and stopped.

"What is the sound of one nerd clapping?" said Buford philosophically, punching the smaller boy in the shoulder. Baljeet yelped, but Phineas was too caught up in his explanation to notice.

"This incredible device is one of the most complicated machines Ferb and I have ever constructed," the boy continued happily, seeming very proud of the accomplishment. "It is so named because this is at least the _tenth _time we've had to rebuild it."

"It kept spontaneously combusting," Ferb explained placidly.

"And besides, it sounds cool," said Phineas cheerily. "But that's off topic. So, as you've probably already guessed, the Triple T is designed for portable time travel! It works like this- if you point it at a wall or something, it makes a portal-style gateway for people to step through. If you point it at a person or object, then it transports that person or object back in time!" He grinned happily, and Perry nodded in appreciation. It seemed pretty good, but he did hope there was some kind of restraint that would prevent it from blowing up after being used a few times.

"Weird how everybody seems to be building time machines lately," he remarked, reflecting on the very machine that had started the whole mess.

"It gets weirder," Phineas assured him. He quickly began to explain again. "See, Ferb and I were all set to go back into the past with this thing and change the future. But…we didn't know what to change. And we knew that we couldn't just keep going back over and over- it would take too long, and who knows what weird effects it would have on us. So we would need to know just what led up to LOVE MUFFIN taking over, and prevent that. But it was hard to put the pieces together." He smiled at his pet, and added, "And then you came back."

Perry blinked. What did he have to do with this?

"See, when Ferb and I heard your story, the first thing we thought of was what your nemesis had done," Phineas explained, beginning to pace before them as he did so. "He had built a time machine and basically gotten rid of you, and we know from extensive research that he was a prominent figure in the Tri-State Area takeover. The reason why he was able to do this is simple-" He paused and looked up, wearing an almost solemn expression. "He had eliminated the one person- er, platypus- who could stop him."

Perry's eyes widened a little. So…the whole mess had started because he accidentally fell into Doofenshmirtz's stupid machine? Ouch. But something in Phineas' eyes told him it wasn't his fault.

"Without anyone to stop him, Dr. Doofenshmirtz basically had free reign for a while," Phineas continued grimly, "and he definitely took advantage of it. Soon, the rest of LOVE MUFFIN learned to get rid of their nemeses and move on to greater things, and the next thing we knew, we were stuck in this completely unprecedented dictatorship. But," his eyes glinted here, and he smiled determinedly, "now that you've cleared up what happened the day you disappeared, Perry, Ferb and I have been able to work out what we should do!"

Perry now felt rather impressed. "One minute it's a rollercoaster, and the next it's a plot to overthrow an evil organization," he mused, shaking his head in disbelief. "You guys grew up _way _too fast." Then he looked back up with a curious smile and asked, "So, what are you planning to do?"

Phineas grinned. "Simple," he said. "Ferb and I will use the device to go back to the very day you disappeared and subtly prevent that, all the while attempting not to be seen by anyone."

Just then, Baljeet raised his hand. "Um, Phineas, why do you not want anyone to see you?"

Phineas shrugged. "Well, I don't know, it just seems like-"

Buford cut him off harshly. "Didn't you read Harry Potter, man?" he demanded heatedly, grabbing his friend's shirt collar as he spoke. "You can't get seen!"

"Okay! Okay! I concede!" Baljeet squeaked in terror, and he did.

Phineas just cleared his throat and tried to brush that off as normal. "Right…well, anyway, that's what we're going to do. It sounds simple, all right- but it might be harder than it looks. Ferb and I don't know exactly what happened that day, so we'll need you to give us an in-depth explanation in order for us to grasp the situation better."

"But why not just take me with you?" Perry protested, eager to offer his services to the Rebellion. "I am a secret agent, after all- and if not for my mistake that day, none of this would have happened."

Phineas looked worried. "No, Perry, this isn't your fault at all," he tried to assure his pet.

"Maybe so, but I still want to help," said Perry, uncomfortable with the thought of letting the boys go alone.

However, at this, Phineas furrowed his brows in a stern manner. "No, Perry. It's too risky- if anything happens, we couldn't bear to lose you again."

Perry was about to speak up and try to argue, but a certain gleam of determination in Phineas' eyes made him stop. It was the same obstinate expression he'd seen on Doofenshmirtz just the day before- and Phineas was not going to give up the wheel.

He sighed and tilted his gaze downwards, abandoning the chase. "…Okay."

He could not see how exactly Phineas reacted, but it was a moment before he spoke again. "…Well. Now that we've shown you the Triple-T and told you about the plan, it's probably about lunchtime. Why don't we all go get some food?"

Ferb gave the usual thumbs up, and the other three cheered. They all stood to leave the tent, and before long, Phineas, Ferb, and Perry were the only ones left. Perry got out of his seat quietly, then stole a glance up at the boys. They were both wearing slightly concerned, apologetic expressions, but Perry wasn't giving up.

He put a paw on Phineas' leg and looked up at him. "Phineas, I wouldn't be a bother, really. If you'd just let me come-"

Phineas stopped him with a shake of his head. "Sorry, boy. You looked out for us all those years- now we just want to look out for you," he told his pet solemnly. Then, squatting down to pat him on the back, he added, "It's for the best."

Perry held his gaze for a moment, then nodded dejectedly and followed them out of the tent. That was it, then, he supposed. Phineas and Ferb clearly had no intention of giving in to him anytime soon.

Still, they weren't children anymore, even if a small part of Perry's mind still wanted to think of them as such. They could handle themselves. And after all, for his family, he had always felt he could do anything- even if that meant doing nothing at all…

Or at least, he could for the moment.

_To be continued…_


	13. An Appointment With the Doctor

**Author's Notes: **YAY DOOF

I missed him too. ^w^ And I missed editing for him and Perry.

That was fun!

/edit

Before I get to the actual chapter, I'd like to thank everyone who has reviewed, liked, and overall enjoyed Time and Time Again. ^-^ But in particular, I'd like to thank all those who have submitted unsigned reviews, since I can't directly reply to them. So to those who have reviewed, those who have read, and those who have liked- arigato! :D

And now for my favorite part aside from that;

DOOFY'S BAAACK! :DDDDD

I lurve him soooo. x3 And I love writing for him, too. Sadly, he's not in the greatest mood. I guess he probably won't be for the rest of the story… o.O

Oh, and as for the boys' forgetfulness…I blamed them, but it was really my fault. ^^; Yeeeaaahh…I bet you were all starting to wonder about that 'force field' armor. XD

Arigato, and enjoy! :3

Lunch at the mess hall was a quiet affair for Perry. Phineas, of course, was his usual talkative self, and his friends were just as amiable (though of course Ferb remained silent), but Perry wasn't quite in the same lighthearted mood they all were. After Phineas' blunt refusal to allow his help in their plan, he couldn't help but feel as if he really should be doing more. It wasn't his style to sit around and wait while someone else got the job done; Perry preferred to be in the thick of things, helping to solve any pressing matters that might come up. Especially if he was already involved in those matters.

But for the moment, it seemed there was nothing he could do. Phineas hadn't reacted well when he asked to assist him and Ferb, and Perry wasn't keen on bringing the subject up again if it upset him. Besides, something told him he wasn't going to have any luck if he kept pressing the matter- so instead of pursuing the topic, he merely listened quietly to the conversation that the boys and their friends were holding.

After a while, the teenagers had allowed their talk to wander to things completely unrelated to the rebellion, the likes of which did not concern Perry at all. By the time he had finished his lunch, they were discussing how you just couldn't get good lemonade anymore unless you made it yourself, and he was beginning to wonder if his presence was even needed. But just then, a great stroke of luck presented itself, for as he was clearing his plate from lunch, he noticed Major Monogram and Carl the intern sitting at a nearby table, and the Major waved to him.

"Good afternoon, Agent P," he greeted cheerfully.

"Carr t' join ush?" asked Carl through a large mouthful of sandwich, taking care not to drop any of it (and subsequently receiving a scolding from the Major for talking with food in his mouth).

Perry considered their offer for a moment, then nodded pleasantly and hopped onto the picnic bench opposite them, feeling that a conversation with the former OWCA operatives had to be more interesting than one about lemonade.

"So, what have you and your family been up to, Agent P?" the Major asked conversationally, throwing a glare at Carl, who was now slurping his drink.

Perry shrugged. "Just touring around. Seems Phineas missed a few things yesterday- like the fact that Force Field Armor actually uses a force field. I was beginning to wonder about the name…"

Monogram laughed in his gruff way, offering a smile. "Well, you know how it is. When he has to explain a lot of things, he tends to miss details."

Perry had never known Phineas to miss details before, but he supposed it might be from all the work he did for the Rebellion, so he simply nodded in understanding. He still felt that a simple nod was overall better than an actual answer, as it communicated the same thing as anything he could have said, and was a lot quicker as well- not to mention, his being able to speak still seemed to make Monogram a little uncomfortable.

As he pondered this, Carl suddenly seemed to remember something. "Ooh, Agent P," he said excitedly, leaning over the table slightly. "Did Phineas tell you about…the plan?"

Perry glanced around quickly, just to be sure no one was listening, and nodded curtly. "He did."

Carl grinned happily. "Great! So what do you think?"

For a moment, Perry wasn't sure how to answer that. The truth was, he was feeling rather conflicted about the plan because the boys didn't want him to help with it. But aside from his personal feelings toward it…

"It's a good plan," he said simply, cutting off his own thoughts. "They seem to have thought of everything."

But he must have said it with a slightly disappointed air, because Carl raised an eyebrow in response. Perry sighed and answered the unspoken question. "No, really, it's a great plan and all. I just…well, to put it bluntly, they won't let me help."

This seemed to come as a surprise to Major Monogram. "They won't?" he asked curiously. "Well, why not? You're the best agent we have left- besides being the only agent we have left- and they know it."

Perry shook his head. "Phineas says it's too dangerous and he won't let me risk it. I mean, it's a nice sentiment and all, but I've been battling evil every day for years! I'm in danger every time I hit the self destruct button on an Inator, or whenever I get into a fight. I'm used to it by now. And the mission doesn't even sound all that dangerous." He frowned pensively, still trying to work it out in his mind. "All they plan to do is transport themselves back in time and prevent the Time Transporter-Inator from working. How dangerous could it possibly be?"

This time, both Major Monogram and Carl looked confused, which in turn confused Perry. "What?" he asked plainly, tilting his head to the side.

Carl opened his mouth (which was still full of food) to answer, but Major Monogram swatted him reproachfully and he closed it again with a little squeak. Then, with his unibrow half-raised, he said, "Agent P, you seem to be missing part of the story."

"Am I?" Perry asked, slightly taken aback. "What do you mean?"

"Didn't Phineas tell you exactly what happened the day you disappeared?" asked Carl, who had by now finished chewing.

Perry cocked an eyebrow. "I was _there, _Carl. In fact, I was the one who explained it to him."

"Well, then I guess you already know about the saboteur," said Monogram, crossing his arms over his unfinished lunch. This sparked a reaction in Perry, displayed plainly on his face. _Saboteur?_

He was quiet for a moment, before finally responding in a slightly sheepish voice. "Um…the what?"

Monogram chuckled to himself. "Must be another detail the boys missed, although it's a rather large detail to overlook so easily. They must have been very distracted."

Perry did not answer, instead choosing to wait patiently for the briefing he knew he'd get. Major Monogram took a moment to collect his thoughts, and then began to speak.

"After recent research done by Phineas and Ferb, aided by myself and Carl," he began, "we have deduced that your disappearance eight years ago was no fluke. Someone actually traveled back in time and changed the past, in order to achieve their own ends. Now, I don't claim to understand it all- it's very confusing, you see- so Carl is better at explaining it." He turned to the intern expectantly, and he was not disappointed. Carl hastily gulped down the remains of his sandwich and picked up where the major had left off.

"It's like this, Agent P," he began, leaning forward slightly as if the information was some kind of confidential gossip. "Picture you hadn't been transported. Then the future, or present for us, would be peaceful and happy and all that. But someone in that future obviously wanted to change it- someone with the power to do so. So they traveled back in time to a moment that they knew could change the future if they tweaked it a little- you already know what that was- and messed with the Time Transporter-Inator in order to get rid of you. Phineas and Ferb figured it out after you said the doors closed without Doofenshmirtz activating them."

Perry paused, reflecting on that. It was true- as far as he could tell, neither he or Doofenshmirtz had activated the machine that day. Even Doofenshmirtz hadn't seemed entirely sure of what happened. It would make sense if someone else had done it…

"And so, with you gone," Carl continued darkly, "Dr. Doofenshmirtz and the rest of LOVE MUFFIN were able to take over the Tri-State Area. Because of that, we suspect the saboteur was somebody from their group- probably a specially trained agent of darkness!" He said the last part while wiggling his fingers ominously, an eager grin stretched across his face.

"Carl, this is serious. Stop it," Monogram scolded.

Carl's smile vanished and was replaced by a abashed expression. "Yes, sir."

"The problem is, this saboteur isn't from our present, or as you would think of it, this future," the Major continued pensively, putting a hand on his chin (if you could really call it a chin). "He or she came from a different timeline, which of course we cannot reach. So if we can't stop him in his own time, we will have to stop him in the past. Hence the plan, hence the Temporal Transmitter 10,000."

"That's probably why the boys won't let you help, Agent P," said Carl helpfully. "If the saboteur turns out to be somebody we don't want to mess with, they don't want you to risk your life for them."

"I'm sure he knows that, Carl," said Monogram. Perry nodded, suddenly understanding their concern. He still didn't really agree, but he did understand; although he couldn't help but wonder why Phineas hadn't mentioned it in the first place. Perhaps he really was just feeling forgetful.

However, Monogram wasn't finished. "Oh, and Carl," he added, elbowing the freckle-faced intern, "you forgot something…"

"Oh, that's right!" Carl exclaimed, his eyes widening as the forgotten thing came back to him. He then donned a rather awkward frown, as if he didn't want to say it. "But, sir…"

Monogram sighed. "You don't have to make such a big fuss, Carl. Sheesh." He cleared his throat promptly and prepared to explain it himself. "The thing is, after the boys change the past, the future will change as well. And that means it will disappear."

Perry's eyes widened just a bit. "You mean, everyone in this future will…"

"Vanish from existence, yes," Monogram confirmed in his usual businesslike tone. "But that's not all." At this, his expression darkened just a bit, which made Perry quirk an eyebrow. He seemed uncomfortable somehow, as if he didn't want to say it either (Carl, he noticed, couldn't help but hold in a tiny smirk of satisfaction).

"No one who meddles with time can escape without paying the price. So, anyone who has visited the future…" he continued soberly, "…will also disappear." Then, having finished his explanation, he sat back on the bench with a grimly set face, watching Perry carefully for his reaction. Carl attempted to do the same, but instead of merely leaning back like his superior, he fell right off the bench.

Perry's breath had grown quiet, and his eyes were wide. There was a clear note of disbelief etched on his face, and although he wasn't about to fall off the bench like Carl, it was still a stunning and unsettling concept. Sure, he supposed it made sense that the residents of this future would disappear if it changed, but he wouldn't have guessed that he would disappear, too. Either way, it was a terrible thought.

"I…I definitely didn't see that one coming," Perry murmured in a rather stunned tone. Monogram just nodded, as if he knew the feeling, while a groaning Carl pulled himself back up onto the bench. Suddenly, something occurred to the platypus, and a weak, almost contemptuous grin stretched across his bill.

"Well, at least if we're all going to vanish, Doofenshmirtz will vanish too," he stated, trying to enjoy the fact that he would be rid of his nemesis once and for all when it was all over. Monogram nodded in agreement, seeming to share his sentiments.

"That'll be nice, won't it?" he asked, gaining a slightly wistful smile. "You'll be able to have days off whenever you like, Agent P, and I can take a nice long vacation somewhere…"

"Um, sir, won't the rest of us all be nonexistent by then?" Carl piped up from his newly regained seat on the bench.

"Don't burst my bubble, Carl," Monogram snapped back.

Perry smiled to himself, somewhat comforted by their familiar banter. Then another thought came to him, and he felt he had to voice it.

"Say, where is my nemesis, anyway?" he asked, gaining a playful smile. "Is he up to anything?"

Monogram did not hesitate to answer. "Oh, Dr. Doofenshmirtz has been put away in a very secure location. I don't think he'll be troubling anyone at camp."

Perry raised an eyebrow. "So you've locked him up somewhere?"

Monogram nodded curtly. "Yes, he's in our jail at the moment. It's perfectly secure, of course, so you don't have to worry about him getting out."

Oddly, Perry found that this was not what worried him. He fixed his gaze on the table for a moment before adding in a low voice, "I bet he's furious with me."

"I wouldn't be surprised," Monogram confirmed briskly. "But don't worry, Agent P- I'm sure you've got better ways to spend your time than thinking about that."

Perry nodded, continuing to eye the table, and Monogram stood to clear his plate. He was quickly emulated by Carl. "Well, it's been nice talking to you, Agent P," he said, saluting the agent. Perry answered with a salute of his own, and the major subsequently left for a nearby trash can. Carl was about to follow him, but Perry managed to catch his attention for a quick word.

"Hey, Carl," he started pensively, "where's the jail?"

Carl pointed off in a westerly direction. "Over there, behind a few tents. It's conveniently placed between a bunch of soldiers, so if our prisoner tries to escape, he'll be caught pretty fast."

Perry glanced skyward briefly, wondering why everyone was so hung up on the thought that Doofenshmirtz might escape. If there was one thing about the mad scientist that Perry had learned, it was that he was a bit of an imbecile, and no one knew that better than him.

"Trust me, Carl, catching him won't be a problem," he assured the intern, quite confident in his enemy's idiocy. "He wouldn't escape in the first place."

Carl just nodded, wearing a slightly dubious frown. "Right," he agreed hesitantly. "Just keep in mind, Agent P- after eight years, anyone can change." With that, he bid a hasty goodbye and rushed off to catch up with Monogram, leaving Perry to ponder that. Well, clearly the intern was right- Carl himself, for example, usually didn't have such deep thoughts.

It didn't take him long to gather his bearings and start off in the direction of the jail, directing a lone glance back at Phineas and Ferb before he did so. Phineas caught his eye, saw the direction he was headed in, and seemed to comprehend. Perry smiled slightly, tipped his hat, and began to leave.

Back at the table, Phineas sighed. Isabella, Baljeet, and Buford had gone to clear their plates, and he and Ferb were the only ones left. Ferb, who was quietly sipping his drink, paused for a moment and glanced up at his brother questioningly.

Phineas, whose mind was clearly occupied, decided to answer. "Well, it's just that I've been thinking, Ferb," he said carefully, considering the words as he spoke them. "I've been wondering…why Perry is in our future at all."

Ferb blinked, signaling his brother to continue. Phineas did so with vigor. "See, if all goes well with the plan, won't Perry's life go on as normal? So he shouldn't _be _in our future. And if you think about it, that would mean we already changed it, in a sense, and we'd be enjoying the good future right now." He paused, cocked an eyebrow, and inquired, "Did that make any sense?"

Ferb quickly added his own wise input. "So you're saying if the outcome of our mission is favorable, then we shouldn't be sitting around here and Perry shouldn't be in the future."

Phineas nodded. "If you think about it," he continued thoughtfully, "it offers several solutions. One is that our plan…is going to fail. We will fail to change the past, and so we continue to live in this future today." He grimaced. "That also means Perry will never go home. And we all know that would…well, that would be royally bogus."

Ferb nodded fervently, curling the corner of his mouth in a tiny smile. "Most non-triumphant."

"It could also mean," Phineas elaborated, gaining a slightly more hopeful appearance, "that we're stuck in a temporal loop, which will end if the mission succeeds. Either explanation seems possible to me. One of them means that we're stuck like this, which isn't so preferable. The other means that our future _will _end- who knows when, though- and we'll be relieved of this existence someday. I can only hope that day comes soon…" He sighed heavily, placing his hands on his temples in frustration, and mumbled, "But in the meantime, I wish it would hurry up."

Ferb just rolled his eyes. All the same, after eight years of waiting and working, he couldn't help but share Phineas' somewhat impatient sentiments.

Suddenly, Phineas' eyes widened slightly as something else occurred to him. "But," he added, glancing back up at Ferb, "we shouldn't tell Perry about this. Picture how he'd feel if he learned that he could possibly be fated never to return to his own time!" The redhead shook his head sadly. "It'd crush him. We've got to keep this one to ourselves, okay, bro?"

Ferb took only a second to deliberate, nodding in agreement almost immediately. Phineas smiled and gave an answering nod, feeling that the conversation had finished itself.

So now they were keeping secrets from Perry. What a strange reversal.

By the time Perry reached the Rebellion's jail (it seemed an awfully long road when he walked it alone), he had begun to wonder why he was going at all. This was Doofenshmirtz he was talking about, after all- surely the man deserved no concern from Perry, of all people (er, platypuses). Yet somehow the secret agent couldn't help but wonder how he was doing, and hope he wasn't too angry with his nemesis to talk.

And for whatever reason, he also felt a strange obligation to try to explain things, to make Doofenshmirtz understand that he wasn't _trying _to look for the Rebellion (although it had been at the back of his mind for days) and he had merely found them by accident. He supposed it must have been his conscience. The darn thing was always getting in his way.

The jail, as Perry realized when he came to it, was really just a tent- but it was heavily fortified, unlike most of the others. The first thing he noticed was the cameras under the awning, continually scrutinizing the area for visitors- or escapees. The next thing he saw was the large plates of metal that appeared to be attached to the walls, and presumably sunk into the ground (it looked like Phineas and Ferb had taken an awful lot of precautions). They even appeared to be collapsible, which would help with portability. Despite the fact that he wasn't really there to admire what was obviously the boys' handiwork, Perry couldn't help but do just that with a proud smile.

As he approached the tent, he was greeted by a strange feeling of apprehension and two armed guards at the front. Upon seeing him, they both saluted, obviously recognizing his status as an agent of the OWCA. Perry, flustered but pleased, hastily saluted back.

"Good afternoon," he greeted them briskly, craning his neck to meet their eyes. "I'm here to visit a prisoner…" And without a further word on his part, he was instantly allowed entry.

The inside of the tent wasn't particularly different from the outside- the walls were clearly protected, although they didn't have any metal plating on the inside, and the space within was divided into several different cells. Each of these was guarded by what at first glance appeared to be a curtain, but at second glance proved to be a sheet of sturdy metal, stuck into the ground and attached to the tent. Embedded in the metal was a cold gray door, and in the hall-like center of the tent were several more guards.

"We actually only have one prisoner," said one of the guards who had let him in, gesturing to a cell on the right side of the room. "He's in there."

Perry nodded, imagining his nemesis on the other side of the door. He'd probably be sulking, Perry thought, and he'd definitely be angry with the agent. But then, there were few occasions when he wasn't, for one reason or another.

"So, can I talk to him?" Perry asked hesitantly, noticing the lack of a window.

The guard considered for a moment, then consulted hastily with his colleagues. After a hurried debate, he returned with an answer. "Well, you can go inside, if you like."

Perry took a moment of his own to consider, and decided that even if Doofenshmirtz were to try something, he was so little of a match for the secret agent that it could hardly pose a threat. He nodded curtly. "Thanks, that'll be fine."

A moment later, he was stepping through the metal door and into the interior of the cell- which, upon closer inspection, was pretty well-lit, instead of dark and gloomy like he'd expected. There was a small window at the side of the room and a light on the ceiling, both filling the little chamber with a soft luminance. It didn't help, however, that this also cast many different shadows around the room. The most dramatic one was under the cot, where it seemed any dark thing could hide. A few more fell in the corners, which, Perry noticed, seemed the perfect place to sit quietly and think.

And with so much to think about, of course that was just what Doofenshmirtz was doing.

He gave no sign to acknowledge that Perry had entered the room, remaining in a sitting position with his back to the right-most wall. His face was in shadow and appeared blank from Perry's position, although a gaunt flash of irritation could have passed over it. For a moment, neither of them spoke, the prisoner waiting for his visitor to make a move, and the visitor taking the chance to examine the other. But Doofenshmirtz had never been fond of silences that lasted too long.

A wisp of a sigh escaped him. "Ah, Perry the Platypus. How unexpected, blah blah blah."

Perry remained perfectly still, giving no response, and the doctor continued. "Well, this is a strange reversal, isn't it?" he queried, turning his head in Perry's direction. "Now I'm trapped and you're not." He shifted his position, drawing his knees closer to his chest, and frowned irritably. "…I don't like it."

The resentful mutter had nearly the opposite effect on Perry, however, causing a faint smile to play across his lips. "It's definitely strange, that's for sure," he agreed, in concurrence with his enemy for once.

Doofenshmirtz nodded in agreement, then caught himself and stopped. He directed his gaze to the wall again, apparently trying to ignore Perry. A moment later, he spoke again, still refusing to make eye contact. "This is all your fault."

Perry just sighed, quite used to the phrase and the tone with which it was spoken by now. "Wow, we're just always blaming each other for everything, aren't we?" he speculated, remembering the frequent occasions scattered throughout the years of their enmity. Besides all the times Doofenshmirtz had shouted that something was Perry's fault, Perry had lost count of all the times he'd silently thought the same thing about his enemy. It got rather tiring after a while.

"Speaking of blame," he continued, his expression rather serious now, "You're mistakenly putting it on me. It's not my fault you're in here."

Doofenshmirtz was clearly irked by this. "Oh, isn't it?" he snapped, facing Perry with an annoyed scowl. "You're the one who deliberately brought me to the rebel headquarters! I bet you knew I was gonna follow you the whole time, huh?"

Perry's eyes narrowed instantly, and he mirrored the indignant expression. "Oh, sure. It's all about you!" Then he rolled his eyes. "It was your own choice to follow me, and you know it. And besides, why would I go looking for some random rebellion that I had _no _lead on, rather than the two people most important to me?"

Doofenshmirtz blinked in bemusement. There was an awkward silence. Realizing what he had said, Perry's eyes widened and he frantically attempted to cover it up. "I-I mean, the two people most important to my cause!" he insisted, a little flustered. "Like, um…Monogram and Carl! 'Cause, y'know, they…they might be able to help me…"

He trailed off awkwardly, then hastily directed his attention to the window at the side of the room. Doofenshmirtz just stared, raising an eyebrow suspiciously. Thankfully, he shrugged it off as nothing.

"Well, no matter what you say, I'm still mad at you," he stated stubbornly, although he remained facing his nemesis.

Perry, still looking toward the window, wasn't surprised. "When _aren't_ you?"

Doofenshmirtz didn't answer directly, but he did speak again a moment later. "…Y'know, I really thought things were gonna change."

Perry blinked, not understanding what he meant.

"But then there was the whole Rebellion incident…" Doofenshmirtz continued, sounding a bit regretful. "Well, things definitely changed. Just not the way I thought they would."

Perry still didn't understand. "What do you mean?" he asked curiously, turning back to face his nemesis.

Doofenshmirtz shrugged. "I don't know…I just thought things would get better."

"Better?" Perry asked, with an inquisitive tilt of the head. "Like, better for you or better for Danville?"

Doofenshmirtz didn't seem to know how to answer, as he took a moment to think about it. "Uh…me?" he concluded uncertainly. Then he growled in the beginnings of annoyance. "I don't really know, okay?"

"Well, how did you think it was going to get better?" Perry inquired testily, getting impatient with his nemesis. "What does 'better' even refer to in thi-"

Doofenshmirtz threw his hands up in frustration, glaring at his enemy. "Stop questioning me! Geez, I should have known you'd do this. Fine! If you're going to pester me, then I'll just spill like I always do." He shut his eyes tightly and crossed his arms. And then he really did 'spill', his words coming out like a fast-moving torrent of water. "I really thought things would work out and go back to normal for us, like they always were. I figured somehow I'd still be able to try my various evil schemes, and you could still foil them, and then maybe I wouldn't be so bored and lonely all the time…but that doesn't matter, because LOVE MUFFIN probably wouldn't approve, what with all their stupid regulations that _I _never agreed to. And I bet it never even crossed your mind!" At this, he paused resentfully and threw a sideways glare at Perry, who looked stunned. "It's actually pretty weird, if you think about it. It's been eight years for me and two days for you, but you already forgot how things used to be for us, didn't you? Well, _I _never forgot!"

His voice was raised slightly at the last part, and it had a sort of defiant anger that seemed to be more and more prominent of late. With the same defiant air, he turned to fully face his nemesis and exclaimed vehemently, "All these years, all I've ever really wanted is for things to go back to normal!"

Perry fell silent, eyes wide and breath halted. So that was it? That was why Doofenshmirtz had continued to pursue him, insist on staying with him, and refuse to be left behind? Somehow it seemed…strange. Out of character. He felt he needed confirmation.

"So…that's why you kept following me?" Perry asked, his tone soft.

Doofenshmirtz hesitated, then nodded firmly and shank back into his corner. Perry did not quite know what else to say. They both fell silent.

Then, something began to dawn on Perry. Doofenshmirtz had said he only wanted things to go back to normal- but now that the boys had told him of their plan to change the past, Perry knew that they wouldn't. Not really. Both of the nemeses would have vanished from existence by then, and neither of them would get to enjoy the usual schemes and battles that they once had. It was a gloomy prospect, one that Perry felt he could not mention…but, as he considered it, an idea came to him- one that he felt he had to voice.

"Hey, here's an idea," he began thoughtfully. "Since you're so conveniently trapped, why don't we reverse things and have me tell you about an idea of mine?"

Doofenshmirtz blinked, surprised. Then, narrowing his eyes suspiciously, he asked, "What kind of idea?"

Perry shrugged. "An interesting one."

"Interesting how?"

"Do you want to hear it or not?"

Doofenshmirtz was quiet for a moment. Then, eyeing his feet, he adjusted his sitting position to a more comfortable one and shrugged slightly. "Sure…why not."

Perry smiled. He had hoped a bit of light banter would help with his nemesis' mood, and it appeared to have worked somewhat. "Good." Then he uncrossed his arms and clasped his hands behind his back, prepared to get down to business. "First off, I just wanted to say that I haven't forgotten about you- there's been so much going on lately, I haven't had any time to come and visit. So, sorry about that…"

As he spoke, he stole a quick glance at Doofenshmirtz, who was now watching him closely with a sort of childlike curiosity. The doctor quickly looked away, but it was too late to hide his curiosity.

Perry almost chuckled at the sight of him. Then he continued, "…You know, it feels weird; being in close contact with you without suspicion of an ulterior motive."

"Oh, believe me, it's mutual," Doofenshmirtz confirmed, with a faint smile.

Perry nodded, with a quiet laugh. He'd never quite talked to Doofenshmirtz like this (well, not that that was particularly impressive, as he hadn't been able to talk until a few days ago, but all the same) and it felt strange. Strange…but pleasant somehow.

In any case, he had to get going with his idea. He cleared his throat, and then continued talking in an interested tone. "Second, I was thinking just now about how you're stuck here anyway, and I'm getting bored." He paused, feeling a little uncomfortable, and ventured, "Well, this'll sound weird…but if I can get permission, we might be able to have one last old-fashioned showdown right in the camp."

Having stated his offer, he shrugged as if to say, "Why not?" and waited for Doofenshmirtz's response.

His enemy merely blinked, looking rather surprised, and was silent for a moment. At length, he responded, "But, Perry the Platypus, what about my Inators? We always fight over an Inator."

Perry frowned, taking that into hasty consideration. "Ah…hm. I don't know, I haven't really thought this out." Then he grinned and added, "Too bad you don't have that box of spare parts from Norm's backseat, huh?"

Doofenshmirtz laughed lightly. "Yeah, too bad…hey!" He frowned suddenly. "Where _is _Norm, anyway?"

Perry thought about that for a moment. "I…guess he's still outside the house."

Doofenshmirtz raised his eyebrows. Perry looked away awkwardly with a small twinge of guilt. Suddenly, an image flashed through his mind of Norm, waiting outside the house and singing, "Ninety-nine bottles of milk on the wall, ninety-nine bottles of miiilk…" And at this, he could not help but snicker and convey the idea to Doofenshmirtz, who laughed along with him at the thought.

"Sorry about Norm, by the way. I really did intend to send him back," Perry said after they had calmed down. He just felt it was necessary.

"Ah, it's okay. He can drive himself home if he wants anyway," Doofenshmirtz assured him with a flip of the hand. Then, his smile deepened in a sort of appreciative way, and he said, "And, as for your idea…Inator or no Inator, I think I'd like that," he concurred, the smile growing slightly bigger.

Perry returned it, despite the fact that he almost never smiled for his enemy. "So, no hard feelings?" he asked tentatively.

Doofenshmirtz shrugged. "Well, no more than usual."

Perry's smile widened a little. "Good enough."

A moment of understanding passed between them, and for once, they were equals.

Truly, Perry reflected, if there was anything both of them could conclude from the slew of events those past few days, it was this; they had certainly been odd.

A few short minutes and one surprisingly affable goodbye later found Perry in the thick of tents that made up the Rebellion camp, trying to find Phineas and Ferb. After his talk with Doofenshmirtz, he was excited to set up the appointment they'd discussed, but since he couldn't just go setting prisoners free at random, he needed the boys' permission first. Since they were the leaders of the rebellion, he was sure they had the authority to either allow it or advise against it, and he was eager to hear their verdict on the subject.

As he wound his way through the tents, Perry went through a mental list of locations where the boys could possibly be. They could still be in the mess hall, or they could have gone to work on the Triple T in their makeshift laboratory. They could even be back at their tent, which was only a short ways off. However, despite the long list, it turned out that he found them quite soon- since it was the two of them who found him first.

"Perry! Hey, Perry, over here!"

The call directed Perry's attention to his left, where Phineas and Ferb were coming down the path towards him. Phineas was leading the way with a cheerful smile, while Ferb followed behind him like a puppy. Their friends were absent, probably pursuing their own training or something of the sort. Perry waved happily as they approached.

"Oh, there you are, boys," he greeted, earning a giggle from Phineas. "I was just looking for you two."

"Same here!" Phineas responded brightly. "Well, except we weren't looking for us, we were looking for you."

"I figured," said Perry, laughing at the teenager's silliness. Then he decided to get down to business. "Hey, guys, there's something I want to ask you about."

Phineas gave an inviting sort of sweeping motion with his hand. "Ask away!"

Perry nodded and explained the situation as quickly and concisely as he could, trying to emphasize that Doofenshmirtz really hadn't been doing anything evil of late, and one little battle surely wouldn't hurt anything. Most of them barely lasted eleven minutes, anyway- the troops could consider it a little demonstration. After he finished, he held his breath and waited for Phineas' reaction.

It wasn't exactly good.

Both of the boys listened patiently to Perry's request, but after he had finished, Phineas gained a rather strict expression. "Perry," he said, his voice as stern as his face, "I don't think so."

Perry tried not to be upset, but he did want to know Phineas' reasoning. "Oh. Well…how come?"

Phineas seemed rather tired of having to tell Perry no over things, but he did his best to answer the question gently. "Well, he's evil, not to mention a member of the very organization we plan to bring down. We can't exactly just let him loose on the camp."

"He wouldn't be loose, he'd be with me," Perry protested, trying to prove his point. "I'm sure I'd have everything under control, and besides, he seemed really excited for the battle, too. I doubt he'd try anything…"

"Perry, no," Phineas stated firmly, putting a stop to his pet's arguments. "It's an unnecessary risk that we'd rather not take. Not to mention, he might hurt you." As he spoke, Perry noticed the concerned way he said it, as if he considered Doofenshmirtz a serious threat. Could the mad scientist really have changed so much, he wondered? Everyone at camp seemed to regard him as such. He seemed just the same to Perry- but maybe that was because Perry was the only one who knew him well enough to tell the difference.

Despite the boys' refusal, Perry attempted to make a final appeal. "Phineas," he started, "I'd be really careful, I swear! Most of the time he can hardly _touch _me, much less hurt me, and I'm not even sure he really wants to anymore-!"

But Phineas silenced him with a single shake of his head. Perry halted mid-sentence, feeling rather embarrassed once more, and fell silent.

"It's too risky," Phineas repeated solemnly, fixing Perry with that gaze of his that said, 'I love you, but I can't let you do this'. Perry looked at the floor to avoid it with a disappointed frown. "And believe me," Phineas continued in a concerned voice, "after years of fighting a war, Ferb and I know about risks."

Perry was silent, his face shadowed by his hat. At length, he nodded, refraining from making eye contact once more. Phineas exhaled softly, then made a remark about meeting up with Isabella and her troop and began to lead the two of them away. Before following his brother, Ferb patted Perry's hat gently in a consoling manner. Perry sighed and followed his green-haired friend obediently, but his mind was elsewhere…

He couldn't help but wonder if Phineas and Ferb were taking enough risks anymore.

_LOVE MUFFIN's Evil Headquarters!_

The sound of tapping shoes filled a dark hallway through which a guard strode, headed for the electronic door at the end. Upon reaching this door, he tapped in a code on a little keypad next to it, and it opened for him. Striding inside, he was greeted by darkness and the harsh illumination of many computer screens, each positioned around a long U-shaped table. Sitting at the table were a dozen men, each wearing the signature badge of a muffin with a heart on it.

"Sir, we have received the coordinates of the target," the man explained briskly.

"Excellent, excellent," drawled an adenoidal voice from the center of the table. "Is everything prepared?"

"Everything is ready, sir. Shall we begin operations?"

The owner of the voice gained a malicious smirk, gazing at his own brightly lit computer screen. "Yes, do that…and waste no time."

The guard saluted his superiors, then turned and left the room, the door closing itself behind him. At the head of the table, Rodney grinned as he observed his computer screen, which was currently displaying a tracking system with a tiny, unmoving dot.

"Ah, yes," he muttered eagerly to himself, rubbing his hands together. "We'll be seeing you soon, Doofy…"

And he let loose a roll of sinister laughter, shutting off the monitor's light.

_To be continued…_


	14. Busted

**Author's Notes: **This one makes me sad. :( I wonder if things would have gone differently for Perry if he had gone to check on the jail like he wanted to…

It was fun to edit, though! ^^

/edit

First off, there is something I need to say;

I have _always _wanted to use the word 'squeamish'. XD

And now for something relatively relevant.

Oh, my gosh, I feel so bad for everybody in this chapter. T^T The poor boys feel like they let their troops down, and Perry feels all betrayed, and Doof is just bewildered and a little concerned. Oddly enough, I feel bad for Doof the most. *SOB*OOH, and you know what else? Turns out my editor (Mom) likes drama, too, so now it's SUPER SAD. Ooooh, I am soooo evil! MWAHAHAHA...Aw, now I feel mean. :(

* * *

><p>The rest of Perry's second day with the Rebellion passed uneventfully, aside from the mini food-fight that Buford and Ferb held at dinner (which ended with Buford covered in peas, while everyone else took cover under the table)- and the agent soon found himself curling up at Phineas' feet, prepared to lose himself to sleep once more. The atmosphere was a little tense that evening, no doubt because the boys knew Perry wasn't entirely pleased with their decisions not to let him help, and not to let him have a last fight with Doofenshmirtz. Nonetheless, Phineas' smile remained fixed on his face, and Ferb showed no sign of awkwardness. Perry, in turn, did not hold back his affectionate purring as they petted him, despite the slightly uncomfortable feeling swirling in his mind. For now, there was nothing he could do, but there was one thing he was sure of- even if he couldn't have his last fight with Doofenshmirtz, he would <em>not<em> let Phineas and Ferb confront a potentially dangerous saboteur alone. One way or another, this was one mission he couldn't miss.

The next morning was cold, which was odd, since it was still summer. A light mist hung over the camp, draping a veil of white over the tents and obscuring things in the distance. Another oddity of the morning was that Phineas and Ferb got up earlier than usual, which went unnoticed by Perry as he wasn't the earliest of risers. In fact, after he woke up, he did not see fit to rise until after the screechy bugler had made his morning call, and even then he remained curled in the rumpled bed sheets he'd fallen to rest on for several minutes.

At last, since Phineas and Ferb had not returned to the tent to fetch him, Perry decided it was really rather unbecoming to sleep late. So, with slight unwillingness, he rose and brushed his fur quickly, then set off for breakfast alone.

Upon arriving at the mess hall, Perry discovered that the boys were not there, either- although Isabella, Baljeet, and Buford invited him to sit with them at their table willingly. Phineas and Ferb, it seemed, had either eaten early or neglected to show up as of yet, which confused their friends. Usually, the boys were very sociable at breakfast time, unless they had some sort of project to work on.

"Which I wouldn't put past them," Isabella assured her friends. "Whenever they get a free moment, you can bet they're using it for something fun. It wouldn't surprise me if Phineas was dreaming about blueprints, and he needed to go write them up, or if they came up with some genius device that they just had to build in the middle of the night."

"Even when they are leading a rebellion, they are always having fun," Baljeet agreed, as Buford pilfered one of his hash browns surreptitiously. "Those two do not know the meaning of work!"

Perry shrugged, picking at his own food half-heartedly. "Maybe they don't know the meaning of breakfast, either."

Just then, the sound of a megaphone turning on echoed across the mess hall, and everyone perked up. "Testing, one-two-three testing…"

"That's Phineas' voice," Perry murmured, wondering what the boy was doing.

There came a noise like someone clearing their throat. "Good morning, troops!" Phineas' cheery voice echoed through the field. "And may I just say that although it's cold, it's a beautiful morning nonetheless! How we doin'?"

A general cheer of assent greeted him, and he chuckled happily. "That's what I wanna hear!" As he spoke, Perry searched the crowd for the red-head, who did not appear to be there. At last, he spotted him standing on top of an empty table, holding a megaphone and grinning happily. Sitting on the bench next to the table, Ferb's green hair was visible over the soldiers' heads.

Phineas raised the megaphone to his lips once more, wearing an excited smile. "Okay, guess what?"

"What?" the soldiers responded in unison.

"Ferb and I were working on something yesterday, which we completed just this morning," Phineas announced cheerfully. "We can't wait to show it to you- but first, a little back story!"

Perry bristled at the words 'back story', immediately thinking of Doofenshmirtz's long, tragic flashbacks to his childhood. But, considering that this was Phineas they were talking about, it had to be more interesting than his nemesis' dreary stories.

"You guys all know that our camp moves around a lot," Phineas began, "and that it's always disguised by the holographic barrier. Wherever we are, it mimics our surroundings and hides our camp from view." At this, he smiled and gestured around him. "Well, you guys have probably been too busy to notice, but we just so happen to have parked our camp in the old abandoned Old Abandoned Fairground!"

Another cheer answered him, along with a round of applause. Across the table, Isabella whispered, "Betcha anything it was already called the Old Abandoned Fairground- and now it's old and abandoned."

"And how d'you know that?" Buford demanded in a low voice.

Isabella just smiled slyly and answered, "Oh, past experience."

"Now, you may be wondering what this has to do with things," Phineas continued jovially. "Well, Ferb and I have been working to fix those old rides all this morning, and we've just finished now. So as a reward for your hard work and a celebration for Perry's safe return, we've decided to give you all the day off to enjoy them! So, who's ready to have some fun?"

An even louder cheer answered this statement, and Phineas' grin grew bigger still. Abruptly, he jumped down from the table and motioned to the crowd energetically. "All righty, then! Follow me!" And without further ado, he marched off through the tents, followed by all those who had finished breakfast.

Back at the table, Isabella, Baljeet, and Buford were each grinning happily, obviously excited by this prospect.

"What a lovely surprise!" Baljeet exclaimed. "It is just like the old days!"

"And a day off, too!" Isabella agreed cheerfully. "Isn't this great, Perry?"

"Yes," Perry answered, a touched smile spreading across his face. "Yes, it is." It wasn't often people rebuilt an entire fairground's worth of rides just to celebrate his safe return. His previous disagreements with the boys seemed to take a backseat, and he was suddenly flushed with gratification.

"Well, why are we sitting around here?" Baljeet spoke up, jumping out of his seat. "We should be out there, having fun!"

"I'm with you!" Buford agreed, quickly mirroring his Indian friend. "Let's go ride stuff!"

"Yeah!" Isabella chimed in happily, and they all dashed off after Phineas. Perry watched their retreating backs for a moment, then began to scarf down his breakfast at top speed (although somewhere in the back of his mind, he was sure it would give him indigestion), intent on following them as quickly as possible. When it came to Phineas and Ferb, he didn't want to miss a minute of the show.

* * *

><p>A short few minutes later, he had finished breakfast and was making his way down the path at a swift jog, headed for the back of the camp. Everyone else had clearly passed that way- the grass was trampled in a long line, like a huge procession of people had just gone through in great haste. Which, of course, they had.<p>

As he sped down the makeshift path, Perry couldn't help but notice that he was approaching the jail, and in the back of his mind, he felt a strange urge to make a stop there. The fortified tent approached steadily, a silver block amongst the other khaki-hued establishments, and he wondered if he should give in to the whim. Of course, he had absolutely no reason whatsoever to visit Doofenshmirtz, and if anything, it seemed a bad idea- it would only result in him having to explain the boys' refusal, and that would only make things awkward. Not to mention, his conscience was thoroughly against telling his nemesis of the celebration, since he couldn't take part in it.

The jail grew closer and closer, and still Perry was dogged by the persistent urge to halt. At last, he caught a glimpse of a carousel spinning in the distance, and began to hear loud laughter coming from it. He stole a final glance at the fortification, then set his jaw firmly and sprinted past, attention fixed on the path ahead. Doofenshmirtz didn't need anything else to worry about, and Perry didn't need any more tension in their unsteady relations. So no matter how uncomfortable he felt, it was probably better to leave the matter alone for now.

"Oh, there you are, Perry!"

He skidded to a halt at the sound and glanced up to see Phineas, beckoning to him from between a few tents and grinning happily. Returning the smile (albeit with a slight reluctance), Perry waved back and approached the teenager.

"Hey, Phineas," he greeted, his good mood returning gradually. "Didn't we meet like this just yesterday?"

Phineas laughed happily, his face flushed with childlike excitement. "I wonder if it'll become a habit!" Then he clapped his hands together, an energetic atmosphere almost emanating from him. "So, ready to come hang out? After all those years when you never got to enjoy our inventions, Ferb and I can't wait to show you what we can do these days!"

He grinned, extending his hand to Perry. "So what do you say?"

Perry reached up to take it, then paused suddenly. Hesitantly, not knowing why he did so, he turned his head to look back at the jail once more, with an unexplainable sense of anxiety. Despite the calm, cheery sense of peace that surrounded the camp and invited him to take part in the festivities, he couldn't help but feel as if something was on the very cusp of happening…something very bad.

"Perry? Are you okay?"

Phineas' voice jolted him into reality, and suddenly the situation seemed to clear itself up. It was irrational to think something horrible was going to happen- especially when there was absolutely nothing to make him feel that it would. The most important thing for now was to take Phineas' hand and join him, let go for a while, and just have fun. Once again, Perry's reason won over his instinct, and he turned with a smile, taking Phineas' outstretched hand and assuring him that nothing was wrong.

But had he known what was happening outside the camp at that very moment, he wouldn't have dreamed of it…

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, while the rebels were enjoying themselves at the boys' festival, a very secretive military operation was taking place just outside their holographic barrier. A huge legion of armored men was assembled on a ridge overlooking the unseen camp, and their leaders were looking down on the valley in confusion. Their tracking devices pointed to this valley as the location of their target- and yet, where they were absolutely sure something should be, there was only grass, dirt, and a few lonely rabbits. In order to better understand the bewildering situation, they had just sent several well-disguised scouts down into the valley to investigate, who were currently winding their way through the scrub and brush. Two of them had gone so far that they were just at the edge of the holographic barrier, although they didn't know it, and the tracking devices they were armed with were going crazy.<p>

"I don't get it, Dean," Joe muttered, shaking his head as he examined the tracker in his hand. "It says he's really close- _really _close- but I can't see anything for miles!"

He turned to his bald companion with a frustrated frown- not that he could actually see him. The two of them were both wearing Disguise-Inators, replicated from blueprints found at Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated, and they were set to the invisibility function. Both of the men were recognizable only by their voices and by the tracking devices they carried, which appeared to be floating in midair.

"They wouldn't have just wandered off into the middle of nowhere, would they?" Joe asked, quite puzzled.

"Doesn't seem like it," Dean concurred, his gaze also locked on his tracking device. "But then again, it does seem like it. It's that kind of thing where it is, but it isn't. Y'know what I mean, Joe?"

Joe snorted contemptuously. "Dean, I have no idea what you mean. Be serious for once, will you? We're on a very important mission! Imagine the rewards we'd get if we were the first to discover the fugitives!" He paused, an unseen, dreamy grin stretching across his face, and added, "Not to mention, we could get our revenge for our _last _encounter with them."

"Our _symmetrical _revenge," Dean added, running his hand over his newly shaven head. Joe grunted quietly in assent.

"See, Dean, that's why we've gotta be serious and find them," he said quietly, peering out from behind the bush he was crouched behind. "You go first. Be stealthy."

For a moment, there was silence; but it was not long before Dean shivered quietly and squeaked, "Uh, I dunno, Joe…what if they're hiding somewhere, waiting to ambush us?"

Joe groaned in an exasperated manner. "Oh, come on, Dean. They wouldn't do that, the platypus is too smart. Don't tell me you're _scared…_"

Dean answered quickly in a nervous voice. "Okay, then, I won't tell you."

"Dean," Joe hissed, beginning to get angry with his squeamish comrade. "Remember the rewards, Dean. Doughnuts, longer breaks, revenge…"

"Nuh-uh. Not doin' it."

"_Dean!_"

"I'm not goin'! You can't make me!"

At last, Joe snapped. "Oh, yes I can!" he growled, jumping out from behind the bush and reaching for about where he thought Dean was. Dean shrieked loudly and swatted at his invisible assailant, and the two of them began to struggle with each other.

"Go, Dean, before I _make _you!" Joe persisted furiously, attempting to shove Dean forwards.

"Noooo!" Dean complained in a panicked tone, digging his heels into the ground. Joe continued to push at him forcefully, until at last, the cowardly minion lost his balance with a shriek and fell face forward onto the scruffy ground below. Joe was so startled that he abruptly froze and fell silent, suddenly aware of the racket they'd been making.

"Y'know, Dean," he whispered, not wanting to raise any more commotion, "maybe I _should_ go first."

Dean moaned weakly, pulling his head up from the dirt it had landed on. "Oh, _now _you agree with me-" Then, quite suddenly, he stopped and stared straight ahead. His jaw dropped; his eyes widened; and a frantic whisper escaped him: "…Joe."

Joe noticed the tense voice it was spoken in and immediately turned his attention to the direction Dean was looking in. Rebels? Fugitives? Crafty, annoying monotreme?

However, none of the anticipated dangers appeared to be there; as far as Joe could see, there was nothing but grass, rocks, and dirt.

"Dean," he hissed back in a low voice, staring intently at the blank valley, "what is it?"

"I think…" Dean responded hesitantly, his voice very low and excited, "…I think it's a tent."

Joe blinked, drawing a complete blank. From what he could see, there were no tents to be found in the area, and Dean's excitement over it was even stranger. "Dean. What tent?"

"It's…a lot of tents," Dean responded, his voice abuzz with anticipation. "Ohh, Joe, we are gonna get a promotion!"

"Dean, are you losing your mind?" Joe demanded in a low voice. "There are no tents here. There're no tents in this whole stinkin' valley, for cryin' out loud!"

"Oh, but there are, Joe," Dean responded calmly from the ground. "Just take a step forward. You'll see."

Joe frowned. "I'm beginning to doubt your sanity, Dean."

"Am I gonna have to show you myself?"

"Show me _what? _There's nothing here!"

Dean tutted under his breath. "Well, don't say I didn't warn you." And with a swift kick to the leg, he knocked his companion off balance, causing him to fall facedown onto the ground, just as Dean himself had.

It didn't take long for Joe to recover, spit a bit of grass out of his mouth, and demand in a harsh voice, "You idiot! What was _that _for?"

"Revenge," said Dean coolly. Although still disguised, was clearly wearing the kind of satisfied grin one gets when they are thinking, 'I told you so.' "So, Joe," he said in a casual voice, "_now _do you see the tents?"

Joe cocked an eyebrow furiously and was about to make a snappy comeback about what an idiot Dean was- before having a sudden revelation, and finding himself too bewildered to do so. He couldn't believe his eyes, for right in front of him was…

A tent.

A _rebel _tent.

Of course, neither of them had any idea of what had just happened; but in reality, when Dean had fallen, he had fallen right through the holographic barrier and landed on the other side, allowing him to see the rebel camp beyond. Dean began to giggle in devilish anticipation, and a malevolent grin slowly twisted Joe's lips.

"Jackpot," he murmured in awe, staring at the blank canvas structure before him. "Ohh, Dean, that promotion is ours."

* * *

><p>Elsewhere, Perry and the boys were enjoying their day at the abandoned fairground, completely unaware of the imminent danger. Currently, Phineas had dared them to go on the most nauseating ride of all- the Twirl-a-Whirl, whose cup-shaped cars spun dizzily in circles until the rider was sick. Phineas' dare was this; whoever could stand the ride the longest without throwing up was the winner, and would get to choose the next ride- if they weren't feeling too nauseous. So far, Ferb was winning; Phineas' face was a pale shade of green, and Perry was beginning to feel hot and feverish.<p>

Despite feeling rather sick, Phineas grinned weakly in a teasing manner. "Ohh, Perry, you don't look so good."

Perry smirked and replied, "Speak for yourself. You're turning green."

"Well, I bet you are, too," Phineas added, his grin slipping as the car took a particularly queasy lurch.

"Phineas, I'm always green," Perry responded teasingly, gesturing to his fur.

Phineas tried to laugh weakly, but quickly stopped to cover his mouth.

A short while later, the three of them finally stumbled out of their car and collapsed on a nearby bench, thoroughly nauseated. None of them spoke for a moment, each taking in as much fresh air as he could get. At last, Phineas seemed to have recovered enough to chat.

"…Well," he started, staring up at the cold, gray sky above them. "I think we have a winner."

Ferb, who hardly looked sick at all, just smiled and gave the thumbs up.

At last, Phineas finally found the will to stand, wobbly though he was. Despite that, he still grinned happily. "That was fun, huh? Let's go ride something else!"

Ferb leapt up immediately, ready for anything, but Perry merely groaned wearily. "I don't know, guys. I'm not feeling so good," he told them earnestly. "Maybe I'll just take a walk or something."

Phineas blinked, then nodded in understanding. "Okay, I hope you'll feel better soon," he said comfortingly, offering a sympathetic smile. Perry returned it, hopped off of the bench, and began to make his way out of the area.

Phineas turned to his brother happily. "So, Ferb, you won the contest. What do you want to ride next?"

Ferb considered for a moment, then pointed up. Phineas followed his gaze until he saw what Ferb was pointing at; the extremely tall, extremely fast, not-as-good-as-the-Coolest-Coaster-Ever-but-still- pretty-awesome rollercoaster they had finished just that morning.

Ferb smiled happily, eyeing his brother to see what he would say.

Phineas gulped nervously. "Oh, boy."

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, Perry was making his way out of the fairground, headed back to the boys' tent. They would probably have water there, which sounded very inviting at the moment, and he was sure that the walk would do him good. A cold wind picked up, pushing against his dense fur and blowing the sparse grass every which way. It was refreshingly cool, and he took a deep breath of it, closing his eyes and letting his feet carry him where they wished. For a few moments, he simply walked, not knowing exactly where he was headed, and not really caring.<p>

When he opened his eyes again, he had reached the camp area and was once more surrounded by tents. A bit of paper blew over the scruffy ground in the breeze, and Perry abruptly realized that he was alone; the rest of the soldiers were gathered in the boys' amusement park, and he could hear their cheerful voices not far away. Somehow, being alone on the cold summer day struck him as eerie- especially with the gray sky above him, threatening rain, and the sudden silence that had fallen over the area.

Suddenly, a tiny noise reached his ears and made him freeze, staring straight ahead at the path between the tents. Thinking he had heard something coming from the tents to his right, he snapped his attention to the area- only to realize that no one was there.

_Must have been my imagination, _he told himself, shaking his head slightly (although he quickly stopped, because it made him feel sick again). Just then, the noise started up again, this time slightly louder. It almost sounded like footsteps, coming from the very alley he was looking down. They sounded loud enough to be coming from right between the tents; and yet, there appeared to be no one there. Instantly suspicious, Perry narrowed his eyes and crept toward the tent, making sure to keep out of the open in case of danger.

As he approached, he noticed something in the alley he'd been eyeing- something that hadn't been there a moment ago. It appeared to be a slip of paper, which seemed to have been carried in by the wind. Perry cocked an eyebrow, wondering who the litterbug was, and once again scanned the alleyway. Nothing moved. Even the suspected footsteps had gradually faded. Still unsettled, he reminded himself that the footsteps could easily have come from someone nearby, or an occupant of a nearby tent. Still, it couldn't hurt to be cautious.

Taking a deep breath, he tip-toed into the alley gently, his own feet hardly making a sound. Quietly, carefully, he picked up the paper and left the alley, now in search of a trash can to deposit the paper in. Maybe his nerves were feeling jumpy again, like they had after the ASA incident.

Perhaps it was the thought of ASA that made him pause, suddenly noticing a single detail about the paper he carried. On its pale, lined surface, there read a handwritten message that caught Perry's attention instantly. He paused, lifted the paper to eye level, and read the message. As he did, his eyes widened in alarm, and the nauseous feeling began to return. For written on the slip of paper was this:

_To Perry the Platypus,_

_If this place means anything to you, meet me outside the camp before two o' clock. Your nemesis,_

_Dr. Doofenshmirtz_

Perry's heart began to race, and for a moment, he couldn't think what to do. Outside the camp? What could that possibly mean? Doofenshmirtz, as far as Perry was aware, was locked in the Rebellion jail- and he couldn't have escaped, or the guards would have sounded an alarm. Maybe he had dropped it out of the window…but as he considered that, he realized that it didn't make sense, either. The window would have been kept closed, to prevent his escape. And how would the note have carried this far?

This note, unlike the majority of threatening notes and messages that came from Doofenshmirtz, seemed oddly serious (and Perry would know, as he had received a great many of those over the years). In fact, even the handwriting was different- Perry was used to Doofenshmirtz's usual scrawl, but this time, it was so messy that it was nearly illegible. Perhaps the stress was getting to him, or he'd written it in a hurry. All Perry knew for sure was that this was clearly bad, and he had to do something about it.

Usually, this would be the kind of thing he would report to higher authority; but higher authority meant the boys, and somehow that struck him as a bad idea. They already thought Doofenshmirtz was dangerous, despite Perry's assurance that he wasn't (usually), and this would only make it worse.

In fact, for all he knew Doofenshmirtz had arranged the entire thing himself, assuming their promised showdown had been approved. So if he really had escaped, perhaps it would be better for Perry to chase him down, take him back to the jail single-handedly, and pretend nothing had happened. After all, he didn't want to worry anyone, and the situation was desperate.

Having made his decision, Perry crumpled the note and tucked it under his hat for safekeeping. Then, without a backward glance, he took off through the camp, racing and weaving between tents like a furry, hat-wearing bullet. The wind rushed past his face and stung his eyes, but he didn't care. Adrenaline pumped through him and made him run faster, his feet flying over the ground with speed unmatched, and his mind was racing, filled with alarm. What if it was already past two o' clock, and he was too late? What if Doofenshmirtz had already gone through with whatever plan he had? And what if it had actually worked?

He shook his head forcefully, attempting to shake the fears away. He didn't have time to worry, especially if Doofenshmirtz was serious.

Just then, he looked up and noticed that he was once more approaching the jail. Now he wished he had visited it earlier, just to see what was going on. And at that thought, another idea occurred to him- why not check the jail now, to make sure it wasn't a false alarm? Perry had no idea why it would be, but it was always worth a check. Abruptly, he switched directions and sprinted down an alleyway between two tents, which he was just exiting when suddenly-

_SNAP._

Moments later, Perry found himself lying on the ground, thoroughly shocked. He opened his eyes and attempted to get up- only to find that he was tangled in some kind of thickly-meshed net, which must have been attached to the end of the alleyway he'd gone through. He tried to struggle out of it, but its hold was tight and unmoving, and it didn't even budge when he tried to bite it. Obviously the thing was a trap- and if Perry knew his nemesis, this was exactly the kind of thing he'd try. But, the only strange thing was, the note said to meet him _outside _the camp…why would there be a net near the jail?

"We got 'im, Joe!"

Perry's heart stopped at the sound of the gruff male voice. That wasn't Doofenshmirtz.

"Yes, Dean. Yes we did."

That wasn't Doofenshmirtz, either. On the other hand, the two voices reminded Perry of something else…something he couldn't quite put his finger on…

Just then, someone seized him by the scruff of the neck and rolled him over so he was facing skyward. Alarm etched on his features, Perry glanced up at his captor and immediately recognized him- not by his face, but by the distinctive badge he wore.

His eyes widened in shock, and all he could say was, "You."

The minion standing over him smirked and turned to another man next to him, who was slightly shorter and grinning excitedly. "Aw, Dean, ain't that sweet? He recognizes us."

"Aww," Dean agreed, wearing a sentimental smile. Joe just rolled his eyes.

"It was a joke, Dean," he criticized. Then he turned his head and added, "He's all yours, Commander." And he stepped back, allowing Perry room enough to see that he was surrounded by many more soldiers, each wearing a black uniform and armor. And behind them, he could see many more streaming in between the tents, all headed in the very direction Perry had just come from- the boys' fairgrounds.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't our little escaped agent," one of the men spoke up from the center of the group. Had Perry been able to see him properly, he might have recognized him as the thickset, square-jawed leader of the group that had attacked him at Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated. "Good thing I brought that platypus net, eh, boys?"

The minions around him all gave their assent, praising their commander for his ingenuity and cleverness. Perry just glared up at them and demanded, "What are _you _doing here?"

The leader smirked and said casually, "Oh, you know, just taking over your rebel camp. Nothing special." At this, all the minions around him began to guffaw loudly, delighting in Perry's fear and confusion.

Perry was absolutely terrified. What about the boys? He needed to escape and warn them, or they would be captured too! And what of the other soldiers? Would they be prepared to fend off LOVE MUFFIN? And where in the world was Doofenshmirtz? Had he really escaped, or was the note a fake? Surely Perry had to warn him, as well. His conscience said he had to.

He struggled as hard as he could, but despite his efforts, nothing happened. Ignoring the ridiculing stares and laughter that echoed from the group around him, he grit his teeth and spoke up again, anger burning in his voice. "How did you find me?"

The commander shrugged, wearing a condescending smile. "Oh, it was easy," he said coolly. "Especially with your little friend's help."

Perry blinked, rather bewildered. _Little friend? _he wondered in confusion. As far as he was aware, he didn't have any little friends who would betray him, only enemies.

And suddenly, his mind came to a halt.

_No._

His first thought was that it couldn't be true. He couldn't have been so completely duped- especially not by his nemesis, of all people! The man had taken care of him after he arrived in the future, helped him escape when he could have just let him be caught, and saved his life at least twice- and even if that was supposed to be part of the plan, Doofenshmirtz was a terrible actor. He couldn't have…it couldn't be true…

As Perry struggled with himself, there came a sudden commotion from a ways off in the camp. Again, his eyes widened as he realized what the noise was- yelling, shrieks of alarm, and frantic orders being shouted. The commander's smirk widened as Perry's breathing quickened, and he said calmly, "Let's go see what the trouble is, shall we? It sounds like they're really getting started now."

He began to walk away, followed by most of the minions. One of them knelt down and produced a long strip of fabric from his pocket, then made to tie it around Perry's mouth. Perry fought and yelled as much as he could and even bit the man at least twice, but eventually, the gag went on. He was then carried away with the rest of the minions, off to see the demise of everything the boys had worked for.

The worst part was that there was nothing he could do.

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, at the fairground, Phineas and Ferb had just gotten off the rollercoaster for at least the third time in a row. Phineas had somewhat recovered from his nausea, but both of them were having a bit of trouble standing after all those loop-de-loops. Eventually, they wobbled over to a bench and collapsed, each breathing heavily.<p>

"Hey," said Phineas after a while, "anyone know where Perry is? You'd think he'd be back by now."

Ferb shrugged to demonstrate that he had no idea either. Phineas frowned, beginning to feel worried for his friend.

"Well, I hope he hasn't gotten lost or anything," he said, wondering just what was up with Perry. He'd seemed kind of down earlier. "But then again, what could possibly have happened to-"

Just then, several shouts of alarm echoed from somewhere in the fairgrounds. Phineas' eyes widened. "What was that?"

The shouts quickly grew in number until it was a real racket, and people were running, yelling, and frantically trying to protect themselves. Phineas leapt off of the bench to see what was happening, his dark blue eyes filled with alarm. Suddenly, Ferb tapped his shoulder and pointed to a mass of black-garbed men, all advancing on them steadily.

Phineas gasped. "Oh, no." Immediately, he turned to his taller brother and said, "Ferb, we're under attack! Sound the alarm!"

Ferb nodded and pulled a button from his pocket. Upon pressing it, warning sirens sounded all over the camp, which only seemed to make the rebels panic more. They were now running every which way in a very disorderly fashion, as none of them had thought to bring weapons with them. The LOVE MUFFIN soldiers advanced quickly, taking prisoners by the dozens and scattering many more.

Phineas face palmed in a rather ashamed manner, then began shouting, "Everyone evacuate! Hurry! Those who can, fight back! Hold them back so the others can escape!" When no one seemed to hear him, he cupped his hands over his mouth and shouted even louder, "EVERYONE OUT! HURRY!"

As his brother continued to give orders in vain, Ferb suddenly froze. Afraid of what he would find, he turned around slowly…and came face to face with a whole host of LOVE MUFFIN minions, who had surrounded them from behind. He gulped.

"Busted."

* * *

><p>Elsewhere, there was only one relatively quiet place in all the camp- and that was the bleak, steel-walled fortification that was the jail. It was almost entirely abandoned at the moment, and even the guards within had been captured by LOVE MUFFIN far before their attack ever began. In fact, the only inhabitant of the jail had absolutely no idea what was going on- although he was beginning to wonder why there was so much screaming coming from outside.<p>

Doofenshmirtz's day had been quite different from the rebels'. Ever since the previous day, all he'd been thinking about was the promised showdown with Perry. After eight crazy years, things were finally going to be somewhat normal again- so long as his nemesis could get permission to let him out for the day. But Heinz had confidence in him. Perry the Platypus, as far as he was concerned, was good at getting what he wanted- unless that happened to be a day off. He never seemed to be able to get one of those.

In fact, Doofenshmirtz was so confident that Perry would get permission for the showdown that he had already started work on a new scheme. Of course, he didn't have very many materials, so it would probably wind up being something lame. But as long as there was some sort of evil going on, Perry was trapped, and he had a monologue planned, he was sure things would be fine.

Currently, the Inator he was working on consisted of a few spare wires he had in his pocket, a few screws he'd painstakingly removed from the cot, and a bit of stuffing taken from the thin pillow that was placed on it. Of course, he didn't actually know what it would turn out as- but so long as it was evil, it would be good enough for him. Being out of sheet metal, he had decided to use his shoe as a base for the machine, which he thought was pretty cool. He had even tried to decorate it with a permanent marker, but the black ink matched the black shoe perfectly and couldn't be seen. So that didn't work.

At the moment, he was sitting on the cot with his legs crossed, trying to force a screw through the heel of the unfinished contraption. Sadly, the rubbery bottom wasn't cooperating, causing the metal implement to slide off each time. Doofenshmirtz was starting to feel a little panicky, as he didn't even know what the thing was yet or what it would do. Even if he wound up calling it the 'Shoe-Inator' and claimed it was a deadly weapon, he still didn't have a monologue to go with it, and that was one of the most important parts.

He sighed tensely, narrowing his eyes as he once again tried to force the tiny metal implement through the heel of the shoe. This time, it actually flew backwards, hit him in the eye ("OW!"), and fell to the ground as if nothing had happened. Doofenshmirtz growled in frustration, rubbing his eye in a pained manner.

"Oh, for crying out loud!" he complained angrily, collapsing on the cot. "At this rate, Perry the Platypus will show up, and I won't even have a clever greeting! I mean, seriously. How am I supposed to build a competent Inator with a _shoe?_"

Unfortunately, there came no answer to his laments, not even from the guard. Not that he had expected one anyway. By now, he was used to talking to himself.

He groaned quietly, trying to picture what Perry would have to say about the situation. "He'll probably wonder if I even tried," he muttered resentfully, reaching down to retrieve the dropped shoe. "I had all last night and all this morning to work, but did I come up with anything? No!" He sighed heavily and stuck the shoe back on his foot, adding quietly, "And the one time I was really looking forward to it, too."

_KNOCK, KNOCK, KNOCK._

He heard the noise loud and clear, but it took him a moment to react. _Oh, no._ Surely that was Perry, come to announce that he was ready for their showdown. And what did Doofenshmirtz have to show him? Nothing.

The knocking sounded again, louder this time. Doofenshmirtz tried to ignore it for a moment, before deciding that even if Perry was bound to criticize, he couldn't just pretend he didn't exist. With a heavy sigh, he called in a wavering voice, "Come in."

The door opened faster than he had expected, and heavy footsteps thumped into the room. Doofenshmirtz blinked, confused, and turned over to see who his visitor was. To his extreme surprise, it wasn't Perry, nor even the guard who brought him his meals- it was three men in black garb and armor, each of them wearing a cupcake-shaped badge with a heart on it. Upon seeing the badges, Doofenshmirtz gasped and backed up against the wall, certain they had come to arrest him.

However, this didn't seem to be the case. Instead, the men stood stock still and saluted him, the first announcing, "Dr. Doofenshmirtz, sir, we've come to break you out."

"We've been ordered to take you back to headquarters," the second man said, pushing the door open wider so his third companion could come in, "and to tell you that your mission is complete."

Doofenshmirtz raised an eyebrow, absolutely bewildered. "Wait, how did you guys even get in here? There's, like, guards and stuff…a-and what mission are you talking about?" He grinned uncomfortably, hoping they were telling the truth about not hurting him. He had enough bruises already. "I don't do missions, that's Perry the Platypus' thing…"

Just then, he thought of Perry and wondered abruptly whether he had been captured as well. "Hey, where _is _Perry the Platypus, anyway?" he asked, slightly concerned and mostly confused. Surely LOVE MUFFIN couldn't catch him so easily, not Perry. He was too clever, too tricky to be caught by a couple of simple minions- but even so, Doofenshmirtz didn't know if that was a good thing or an annoyance. Before he could come to any hasty conclusions, though, the third minion spoke up.

"Don't worry about that, sir," he told the doctor, as the other two helped him off of the bed and led him out of the cell. "We've taken care of him nicely."

**(Sorry for the interruption, but it's about time for some music. :3 Go look up 'Enya- (1988) Watermark- 08 Evening Falls')**

"Wait!" Doofenshmirtz yelped, confused and alarmed. "'Taken care of him'? What does that mean? You didn't hurt him or anything, did you?"

The second minion shrugged. "Well, maybe a little…" he admitted.

Doofenshmirtz struggled for something to say for a moment, not even sure of how he felt about the situation, but was promptly escorted out of the tent and into the grayscale afternoon. A light rain had started up, as if on cue, but even through the wet weather, the sun was still bright enough to sting his eyes and make him shut them in pain.

When he opened his eyes again, he was faced with a slow procession of soldiers and rebels coming through the camp, each of them wearing handcuffs and escorted by the LOVE MUFFIN soldiers. The sudden light made it hard to look at them for long, but as they trudged by, Doofenshmirtz noticed that they all appeared to be in shock, as if they still couldn't believe what had happened, and a few were getting a bit emotional.

Among them were two teenagers, escorted by at least five guards each, who were still struggling to get out of their own handcuffs. One of the guards jabbed a stunning gun at the shorter one and barked something Doofenshmirtz couldn't hear, which subdued the redhead momentarily. However, he wasn't quiet for long- a moment later, he jerked around, straining to see something behind him, but was forced back into position mercilessly.

Feeling a strange mix of emotions, Doofenshmirtz glanced behind the boy to see what he was looking at, and saw another prisoner being towed along. He was so heavily guarded that it was hard to see him, but if one looked past the guards' feet, they could just make out the small form, wrapped tightly in a thickly-meshed net. With his tail dragging on the ground, his gaze turned downward, and his hat pulled low over his eyes, it was hard to recognize him- but without a doubt, it was Perry.

Doofenshmirtz almost called out to him, but his voice caught in his throat. Perry noticed him anyway. He glanced up slowly and observed his nemesis for a moment, his expression hidden by the men surrounding him. Then, with an almost defiant sharpness, he turned his attention right back to the ground ahead of him, as if he hadn't seen anything at all.

Doofenshmirtz just stood there, looking after him until he had disappeared around the corner of a tent. He didn't know what to think, or how to feel. He didn't feel triumphant about Perry's capture. He didn't even feel particularly unhappy about it. He just felt…numb. Like it couldn't really have happened. He might still be dreaming, waiting for the next morning, when Perry would surely come for the anticipated showdown. A showdown that, he now realized, was only wishful thinking.

Behind him, the minions began to discuss taking him back to headquarters to meet with the LOVE MUFFIN council, and to get his reward. Doofenshmirtz hardly heard them, as he wiped the first drops of rain from his cheek; a new thought had just struck him.

He'd never finished his Inator.

_To be continued…_


	15. Doofenshmirtz Debriefed

**Author's Notes: **I had a big list of things to edit in this one. Apparently, that's what I do when I get bored- make huge lists of things I plan to edit in my old chapters. xD

/edit

At last, after so long in near-darkness (or at least, that was the plan), we have finally arrived at the chapter where I get to explain everything! Honestly, I'm amazed things worked out as well as they did. Not because I have bad opinions of the LOVE MUFFIN guys' planning skills, but because it all came together so nicely when I wrote it. ^-^

…Darn, now I feel all braggy. ^^; Y'know what, just read the chapter…

By the way, about plan number '592'…I have a really goofy reason for picking that number. I was going to pick something deep, that had some kind of meaning, but eventually I got lazy and decided to use 592. The only reason for that is that my dad uses it for everything. For example; "So how many years have you been married?" "592." "Do you know how old he is?" "592." "Is that all you can say?"

And then he spouts some weird made up word, like, "CHIMBY!"

…My dad is totally nuts. ^^;

* * *

><p>The ride back to headquarters was a nauseous one for Doofenshmirtz, but it wasn't the bumps and turns in the road that sickened him. All the way out of the rebel camp, he had observed the long stretch of prisoners that had been captured in LOVE MUFFIN's invasion. Each of them had a different expression; some furious, others despairing, some just blank and shell-shocked, like Doofenshmirtz himself. Somehow, despite his ultimate goal being something like this, the long procession instilled some indescribable feeling in him- perhaps guilt was a close enough comparison. Whatever it was, it felt confusing and sad, and he didn't want to have to bear it.<p>

As the sleek black LOVE MUFFIN car drove onward through the streets of Danville, the doctor stared silently out the window in the backseat, still haunted by the numerous glares and downcast faces that he had had seen in the camp. Tiny raindrops alighted on the glass with hardly a sound, each reflecting the outside world in a miniature mirror. On the damp streets outside, the citizens' faces were no different than the rebels'- and with a frown almost reflecting their own dispositions, Doofenshmirtz wondered how he could have never noticed this before. With every face he saw, the bubbling sense of guilt intensified, until he wished very desperately that he could brush it off as nothing; brush it off as if he'd never seen that long line of prisoners back at camp; brush it off as if he'd never seen Perry among the defeated rebels, his head hung low.

Oh, yes. And then there was Perry. Doofenshmirtz just didn't know what to think about him- whether to be glad or upset, angry or uncaring. None of them seemed right- but for that matter, what was wrong? Was it wrong to go through all they had endured together, almost feeling allied, and then dismiss all of that in frenzied triumph? Or was it wrong to feel sorry for him, despite their status as enemies?

Of course, Perry might not even care either way. He was probably already brainstorming a way out of jail, thinking up a way to get the Rebellion back together and defeat LOVE MUFFIN. Being the clever agent that he was, Doofenshmirtz wouldn't put it past him. But truthfully, he really only wanted a good explanation of things (for you see, when one is trapped in a jail cell for several days, things tend to get confusing- and they were already confusing enough in the first place).

The car came to a sudden halt, giving a brief jerk as it did so. It jolted the doctor from his reverie, and he was suddenly conscious of his escorts' voices around him, announcing their arrival at LOVE MUFFIN headquarters. The doors were opened, and a wave of muggy, damp summer air flowed in, reflecting the rain outside. Doofenshmirtz was escorted out of the car promptly and onto the sidewalk, then up the steps to the ominous building before him, whose large, bold sign read _LOVE MUFFIN Headquarters_.

Looking up at the building did not change his disposition- he didn't know what to think of that, either. All he could think was that maybe, maybe he'd get some answers at last.

The long, dark hallway that led to the council room was brightly lit in an almost friendly manner, unlike most days when it was dimly illuminated for dramatic effect. Aside from the high-ceilinged, monochrome council room, Doofenshmirtz couldn't help but wonder briefly what awaited him at its end. Why had he been called back, anyway? And why was everyone treating him so respectfully, the way they had when he was still a part of LOVE MUFFIN? As far as he knew, he hadn't done anything in particular to deserve it, aside from driving Perry the Platypus crazy on a constant basis. For that matter, he'd saved his enemy's life a few times and generally ignored LOVE MUFFIN for the past three days, which couldn't possibly be considered a _good _thing by the council.

And so he couldn't understand why, when they reached the end of the hallway, one of the men even held the door open for him to step through.

The council room was lighter than usual, illuminated by the bluish-white lamps that lined the walls of the half-oval room. The ceiling was still too dark to be seen, giving the whole place an eerie atmosphere. But, of course, that was probably what they were going for anyway.

The highlight of the room was the long, U-shaped table that dominated it, around which an assembly of a dozen or so people were seated. Their computer screens were dimmed slightly, but the light was still bright enough to illuminate their faces in the same eerie manner as the walls. Glinting in the light, their official LOVE MUFFIN badges winked back at onlookers, reminding them of the power of their wearers (no matter how silly it looked).

All this Doofenshmirtz had observed many times, but never with such a feeling of apprehension. As he entered the room tentatively, he felt its occupants gazes locked on him- whether in approval or scorn, he couldn't tell. Shrinking slightly under the stares, he nearly turned back to the entrance to leave, but a few quick footsteps and the sound of the doors closing quickly stopped him. There was no way around it; and the only thing to do was to look up and hear what the council had to say.

"Well, hello there, Heinz."

Rodney's nasal, whining voice brought his attention to the head of the table sharply, and there he was- bald and wrinkly as ever and wearing a satisfied smirk. Doofenshmirtz grinned awkwardly, giving a little wave.

"Um…hi," he greeted uncomfortably, hoping the looks they were giving him were in favor. When no one replied immediately, he cleared his throat and continued, "Nice to see you fellows again!"

He laughed awkwardly. No one else did.

The laughter died in his throat, and he instead ventured, "Ah, so, what have you guys been up to?"

"Nothing much…just monitoring your progress," Dr. Diminutive answered, sitting up a little straighter in his already very high seat.

Beside him, Dr. Bloodpudding nodded in agreement. "Your mission is complete, Heinz."

Doofenshmirtz raised an eyebrow, confused. He still didn't know what mission this was. "But, you guys, I didn't-"

"You've done an excellent job, Doofy," Rodney interrupted in a pleased tone, wearing an unusually appreciative smile. "Really excellent acting on your part. Of course, we were probably better, but you were pretty good anyway."

"It's amazing that you fooled your nemesis so well," commended another scientist, whose name Doofenshmirtz could never remember. "How in the world did you do it for so long?"

"Yah, Doofy," Professor Periwinkle spoke up from the end of the table, his coke-bottle glasses enlarging his eyes to ridiculous proportions. "Tree days is an aowful laong tahme to pwetend to be on sombodeh's saihd."

At this, nearly everyone cocked their head or raised an eyebrow, and there was a collective, "What?"

Periwinkle rolled his eyes in exasperation and opened his mouth to repeat the bewildering sentence, but beside him, a younger scientist spoke up and said, "Did he just say something about trees?"

"You really do need to work on your elocution, my friend," Rodney agreed, snickering behind his hand.

"Yeah, like Rodney," Dr. Bloodpudding agreed.

Rather than be offended, Periwinkle merely grinned and replied, "Electrocution? Tat's a great ahdea! Weh weel shahck arr enemees!"

Everyone else just stared at him, totally bewildered. Doofenshmirtz nearly added that he didn't understand Periwinkle _or _Rodney, but instead decided to ask about something else.

"Wait," he said slowly, still a little confused by everyone's hospitality towards him. "So…I'm not really expelled from the council?"

"Oh, for badness' sake, no," Rodney dismissed the thought with a quick eye roll. "For that matter, why don't you come take your seat?"

Doofenshmirtz's gaze instantly shifted to the chair he was accustomed to sitting at, beside a green-haired scientist whose name he had never learned. The man patted the seat invitingly, and after a momentary pause, he strode up to take it.

"There you go," said Rodney from the center of the table. "Welcome back, Heinz."

At this, there was a brief noise of welcoming phrases, quick handshakes, and greetings. Doofenshmirtz received them with a confused but gratified smile, still not entirely clear on what had happened. He had so many questions, he wasn't sure where to start- but since everyone kept referring to this plan of theirs, he felt could not go without knowing the details of it.

So, trying not to sound entirely clueless, he cleared his throat to speak up. "Y'know, guys, I'm not too clear on the plan…I mean, maybe I wasn't listening in our last meeting, but I can't remember how we said we'd do it."

Rodney rolled his eyes. "Oh, Heinz. We didn't have time to explain what we'd do, remember? Your nemesis reappeared too quickly, and we had to create the plan on extremely short notice. And by short notice, I mean that we sent the minions to your building just five minutes after he was detected."

Everyone else nodded in agreement, and Doofenshmirtz mirrored them slowly. Well, that made sense- they couldn't have known that Perry would have appeared in the future before he actually did, so at least he hadn't missed their explaining the plan. Now he didn't feel like a total dumnkopf.

"Truth be told, we didn't actually _have _a plan then," Rodney continued. "But it didn't take long to pick a course of action. Of course, we couldn't warn you beforehand, so we made sure to give you a signal as to which plan we were using," he explained smugly, obviously very proud of the clever scheme LOVE MUFFIN had enacted. When Doofenshmirtz merely stared at him silently, not entirely understanding, he prompted, "You know, plan number 592? The signal was when Dr. Bloodpudding said you were a traitor over the phone."

At the left side of the table, Dr. Bloodpudding demonstrated, "Cough-traitor-cough!"

Rodney smirked, sure that that would jog Doofenshmirtz's memory. "As in, you pretended to work together with your nemesis, then captured him."

Doofenshmirtz's eyes widened in surprise, the statement somewhat unsettling him. He hadn't recognized any signal (he wondered briefly if they had mentioned that while he was looking up funny cat pictures on his computer), and he certainly hadn't known that he was supposed to pretend to be on Perry's side. Technically, he never was- but now that he thought about it, he realized that it must have almost seemed like that. Had Perry seen it that way? He didn't know. But either way, the outcome was just what LOVE MUFFIN had been hoping for.

Meanwhile, Rodney continued to explain. "After we gave the signal, you said you had heard it, so we knew you were on board. Henceforth, we chose to lay low for a while."

At this, Doofenshmirtz raised an eyebrow. "Lay low? Then what was up with that attack at my daughter's house? You possessed her housemaid robot, remember?"

"Oh, that," Rodney scoffed, rolling his eyes disdainfully. "Well, you see, what happened was we were all out at that anniversary dinner and celebration- which was lovely, by the way, pity you missed it- and we left one of our minions in charge. A little advice, Doofy- never, _ever_, leave a minion in charge."

The others all spoke their agreement in fervent tones, quite exasperated with their underlings' incompetence. Doofenshmirtz was still a bit doubtful.

"What about that time you pursued us in the car, huh?" he pressed. "You didn't order anyone to do that, either?"

"Oh, of _couwse _not, Doofy," said Professor Periwinkle with a casual flip of the hand. "We wood _nehva_-"

"Wait, now I swear I heard him mention cows," the younger scientist interjected in a confused voice. "What the heck, dude?"

Rodney cleared his throat loudly, bringing the talk to a stop. "Anyway, no," he continued, in a rather ruffled voice, "we didn't order that attack. In fact, we were _trying _to give your nemesis a fake sense of peace, so he wouldn't expect an assault later. But honestly, I don't think we would have even needed to, because he fell right into it." He paused briefly and enjoyed a quick, facile laugh, which the others joined in on.

Doofenshmirtz attempted to smile uncomfortably, but he really didn't feel like laughing. Somehow, the thought just wasn't funny. "But, I'm still confused about one thing," he pressed, the unspoken question weighing on his mind. "How did you find us- I mean, him?"

Rodney's laughter had died by now, and he answered smugly, "Well, we tracked you, obviously. Do you remember those cute little pins I gave everyone, Heinz?"

At the words, everyone looked down at their badge, including Doofenshmirtz. Despite all he had been through over the past few days, the little gleaming cupcake was still there, its logo in as convincing a font as ever.

"Those aren't just ordinary badges," Rodney elaborated, regaining his smug manner. "They are specially crafted tracking devices, created specifically for such a purpose as this. So long as you wear your badge, LOVE MUFFIN will always know where you are." The smirk he wore widened a bit, creasing his already wrinkled visage just a bit more. "I did say these things would come in handy, didn't I? Ah-ha! I'm so clever."

Everyone else nodded in agreement, but they didn't seem surprised; perhaps they had already known. Doofenshmirtz, however, simply stared in astonishment at the small cupcake-shaped badge, bearing the ever-familiar heart and LOVE MUFFIN logo. So, they had really been tracking him the entire time? And neither he nor Perry had ever realized?

Truthfully, the only thought that came to mind was this; _How many meetings could I possibly have missed?_

"Using this tracking system, it was easy to put our real plan into action," Rodney continued. "You see, Heinz, the Rebellion has been a thorn in our side for far too long. After a lot of scouting and research in the OWCA files, our results yielded information about its leaders; they were once your nemesis' cover family, and they loved him very much. Apparently he was very fond of them as well." Rodney's smile remained through the whole thing, but it wasn't a nice kind of smile. "Their mistake, as you will see…"

At this, Doofenshmirtz's eyes widened to their full extent. Perry's _family? _That was who these leaders were? It couldn't be, it was just too unexpected…

But, now that he gave it some thought, everything seemed to click. The day they left Vanessa's place, Perry must have been trying to get information on his family and where they were, and that was why the visit with an old friend was upsetting to him. And the house they visited, that had clearly been Perry's- it wasn't platypus-sized and it was much too big for one person to live in alone, so it only made sense that Perry would share it with some kind of human family. And it also explained why Perry claimed he hadn't tried to lead Doofenshmirtz to the Rebellion- he had only been trying to find his family. But, seeing as they were _in _the Rebellion, the two were one and the same.

And yet, LOVE MUFFIN had towed them away with the rest of those poor souls. Somehow, despite Doofenshmirtz's constant desire to find his nemesis' weakness, it felt…wrong. And not in the right, evil kind of way. Just wrong.

But just as the guilty feeling began to bubble up inside him again, Rodney interrupted his thoughts. "So we put two and two together, and came up with a brilliant plan," the bald scientist continued complacently. "Rather than destroy Agent P instantly and then attempt to search for and crush the Rebellion, why not let Agent P lead us to the Rebellion, then destroy them both at once?" He grinned and clapped his hands together grandly. "Genius!"

The others all quickly spoke of how wonderful their plan was, each either congratulating someone or announcing which part he had in it (Doofenshmirtz couldn't help but wonder if they were getting tired of letting Rodney go on and on). It didn't take Rodney long to call for silence again and continue his explanation.

"It was _so_ incredibly simple," he drawled in a self-satisfied manner. "All we had to do was track you until you wandered somewhere suspicious. Of course, we have cameras everywhere, so we kept an eye on you whenever possible. But then, you disappeared through that tree, and we knew we'd gotten you. It seemed you had gone into the middle of nowhere- and we knew you'd found the rebel base.

"From there, we only had to get our own troops organized and ready for an invasion. It didn't take long to get them over to the location, and after a little scouting, we had them invade and scatter everyone. We almost didn't know where it was, because those clever leaders hid their camp in a holographic shield. But we found them out, and we captured most of them, too." Here he loosed a quick laugh. Then, with a sinister curling smile, he leaned forward slightly, and his voice became low and charged, as with electricity. "Ooh, and you know what the best part was?"

Doofenshmirtz was silent for once, but he shook his head. He felt horribly uneasy about the prospect, though he couldn't quite pinpoint why.

Rodney's voice held an almost malicious glee as he explained the next part of his plan, and his chest swelled slightly in pride. "Those leaders- they were so _easy _to capture! Really, just ridiculous. Turns out they were much younger than we thought, practically children- although they were rather intelligent. Want to hear how we captured them?"

Doofenshmirtz's gaze was locked on the table before him, and his brows were knit. He was slowly getting that nauseous feeling again, and he almost didn't want to hear. But Rodney seemed to take his silence as a yes, for he cleared his throat and explained anyway.

"First of all, we had to capture Agent P," he said, "because we knew he'd be a problem if we didn't. He was actually much easier than we thought he'd be- all we had to do was slip him a forged note from you, Doofy, telling him that you'd gotten out of jail. Then we had the minions set up nets on all the quickest routes out- and a few around the jail, too, in case he decided to check there first. He fell right into it- literally."

_So, that's how he got caught, _Doofenshmirtz mused blankly. Perry had fallen for the trap upon hearing that his nemesis was up to something, just like he always used to.

"From there, the troops invaded the camp and captured most of the rebels, scattering the rest. Seems they were all enjoying some kind of festivities and weren't prepared for battle. But their leaders, those two teenage boys, put up quite a fight- in fact, they wouldn't stop fighting for anything." At this, Rodney paused for a moment. But when he began again, his mouth was twisted even further in a cruelly satisfied smirk. "Anything, I say- _except_ the life of their pet."

And he went on to explain just how things had played out. Apparently, after Perry's capture, Phineas and Ferb had kept trying to fight off LOVE MUFFIN. But when the minions brought Perry in, gagged and bound in the net, they were forced to surrender, or he would be hurt. Perry tried to protest and escape, but the boys gave up to save him, and the three of them were dragged away to separate jails. Rodney explained it all in a gloating tone, as if he was telling about some kind of game he had won, or a clever solution he'd come up with to some irritating problem. Everyone else was wearing the same kind of satisfied smirk as well, although a few people were beginning to get bored from the long explanation.

Doofenshmirtz just listened, not really knowing what to think anymore. The evil part of him was inclined to feel triumphant, but something in the back of his mind kept insisting that the whole situation was bad. The one thing he didn't know was, why? It was perfectly normal for LOVE MUFFIN to go around ruining lives and such. Shouldn't that feel even better for him when it happened to his nemesis?

Oddly enough, the answer kept coming up as 'no'.

But Rodney wasn't done talking yet. "And that's not all- it seems we caught them on the cusp of launching a plan of their own; a plan that could actually have brought down our entire organization!"

At this, everyone perked up, each face showing surprise and shock. Rodney nodded slowly, observing the effect his statement had caused. "You see, it seems they were constructing a time machine, which would then be used to travel back in time and prevent us from conquering the Tri-State Area. This device has now been removed from the camp and taken back to headquarters, where we have some more scientists examining it. Before long, they should discover its workings and dismantle it- or maybe just blow it up for fun. Nonetheless, we can now rest easy in knowing that LOVE MUFFIN is safe to run for many more years."

A loud cheer followed the words, and several people clapped appreciatively. Doofenshmirtz really only had one thought; now he knew what Perry meant by 'one last showdown'. His nemesis had been perfectly aware of the plan the entire time, aware that the future was going to change very soon- but he hadn't mentioned it at all.

But before he could really give that any thought, Rodney spoke again. "Ah, it was a good day, wasn't it?" he commented in a pleased tone, leaning back slightly in his chair. "The Rebellion is quashed, the last agent of the OWCA will soon be eliminated, and I happen to have reservations for a very nice celebratory dinner at six. Yes, friends, today is a good day." Then, wearing the most selfishly satisfied smirk you ever saw, he stood and announced in his nasal voice, "Well, that should do for our meeting. Good job, Heinz. I've got to go- more evil to commit, you know- so ta-ta, everyone!"

And with that, they all began leaving, a few at a time, some following Rodney right out the door, while others remained briefly to type at their computers. Doofenshmirtz was left in the dust, not sure what to think at all. If he had thought that the meeting would clear anything up, then he was right in one way- and dead wrong in another.

He sighed and put a hand over his face, trying to think of what to do. Now that he wasn't on the run, things would surely go back to normal- and by normal, of course, he meant those long, unproductive days that he had spent in solitude at his lab, trying and failing to come up with some kind of evil invention. But what was the point, really, if no one would stop him? He had been so hopeful when Perry came back…so hopeful that things would return to the way they were…and now, his nemesis was locked away in a LOVE MUFFIN jail, somewhere far away.

Was it a good thing? He didn't know. At least Perry couldn't bother him anymore. Now he would have truly free reign over the Tri-State Area, or something along those lines…but he wasn't even sure he wanted that anymore…

"Doofy? Yoo okey?"

Professor Periwinkle's high, squeaky voice brought him out of his thoughts, and when he glanced to his right, there he was, head cocked inquisitively. On instinct, he nodded and assured the professor that nothing was wrong.

"Oh, but Doofy, yoo look saaaad," Periwinkle insisted, his brows coming together in concern. He looked a bit absurd.

"I'm not sad," Doofenshmirtz muttered. At least that much was true. He was too conflicted to be sad.

Upon hearing the words, Periwinkle only murmured, "Hm," to himself and quirked an eyebrow. At length, he added, "Yoo know, Doofy, if tere's anyting ah can do to cheer yoo ahp, just ask."

Doofenshmirtz was silent for a moment, trying to sort out his thoughts while considering the statement. Oh, he wished he could talk about the whole issue with someone…someone who would really listen. Anyone at LOVE MUFFIN would surely have a biased opinion; Vanessa might be upset with him and not really consider the situation; and no one else came to mind. Well, aside from Perry himself, but surely…

Just then, a light came on in his head. Perhaps it wasn't the brightest light, but it was a light nonetheless; and with it came an idea. Turning back to the professor, he quickly spoke up. "Hey, Periwinkle, can I ask you something?"

Periwinkle instantly perked up, gaining a not-very-evil grin. "Oh, anyting! Go ahead!"

In spite of himself, Doofenshmirtz nearly broke into a fit of giggles- Periwinkle's voice was just so laughable, it was hard not to- but he tried to ignore the ridiculous accent and go on with his question. "I just wondered…did Rodney ever say where they're keeping Perry the Platypus?"

"Ohh, yesh," Periwinkle replied, putting a hand on his chin in thought. "Yesh, yesh, naow let me see…I theenk he said your platypus was in thee west saihd jail, and his leetle fwiends were on thee eest saihd."

Doofenshmirtz nodded slowly, sorting out the confusing speech in his mind before finally understanding what the professor was saying. Then he offered a small smile of gratitude. "Thanks. I'm, ah…I'm just gonna go now."

"Awl righty, then!" Periwinkle smiled, waving amiably. "Stay eveel, Doofy!"

Doofenshmirtz waved back halfheartedly as he left the room. "Yeah, you too, Periwinkle. See ya."

As the door swung shut behind him and he entered the brightly lit hallway, he had to wonder what he was doing. A million thoughts were swirling through his mind, most of them embodying actions or ideas that he would usually never stop to consider. But after such an unsettling meeting, he was beginning to wonder about things that never usually crossed his mind anyway. The faster he walked, the faster his mind raced, and before long, an idea was beginning to take shape in his head. But was it really a good idea? Or was it a huge mistake? Either way, he had already started walking.

Now, there was no turning back.

_To be continued…_

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><p>Ooooh, suspense! :D<p>

So how was Rodney? Can you picture that crazy voice of his in your head when he talks? That's what I was going for. Otherwise it's just some bald dude using fancy words. XD

As for Doofy, I'm not giving anything away. ;) What's he up to? You'll just have to see...


	16. A Really Depressing Chapter

**Author's note: **First off, I'd like to say that this chapter, like the last one, is probably a little short. But for the sake of making that look good, I'm going to pretend that's because I don't want to keep you from enjoying the holidays for too long. Yeah, I totally planned it like this. ^^; Anyway...  
>I just HAD to release the most depressing one on Christmas eve! ToT WHYYYYYY?<p>

*sniff* Well, I hope you guys can take a break from the Christmas spirit to enjoy some really melodramatic stuff, 'cause this one is _filled _with it. But it gets a little better at the end, and I swear things will get better next time! Now, on with the show...

* * *

><p>"Right this way, sir. He's in cell block D."<p>

"Right…is it okay if I talk to him?"

A quick consultation with the officer in charge provided this answer; "All right, just wait here."

"Okay, thanks."

The waiting room was cold and silent, and it carried a mysterious sense of dread in the air. Somehow, it seemed to have a sort of stressful quality- and if you were already rather stressed, it only seemed to amplify that stress. Combined with the harsh whitish-blue light of a few fluorescent bulbs, it was downright unnerving. Their light cast a cold glow over the bare gray walls and hard cement floor, and it reflected off of a few metal chairs that had been situated around its walls. Sitting in one of these chairs and twiddling his thumbs with a nervous frown, Doofenshmirtz had certainly had enough time to take in all of that, and more. He had been waiting for only a few minutes, but it felt like longer- long enough for him to notice little cracks here and there in the ceiling, a few scratches on the walls, what looked like a tiny pencil doodle on the doorframe. In fact, he was running out of things to look at. He felt as if he had gazed over those walls a thousand times by now, and besides the room there was nothing else to examine, because he was the only one there.

Of course, when there is nothing to look at, one's thoughts often take over. So Doofenshmirtz's mind was working overtime, splitting his energy between wondering about how his visit would go and wondering about everything else. Mixed in with his thoughts was a sense of worry, the source of which he couldn't define. One of the main things that bothered him was that he was bothered at all- it wasn't like him to be so uneasy, and he wanted out. Thankfully, he knew Perry was a great stress reliever (just ranting a little to him made the doctor feel much better), so he was hoping he would feel calmer once he met with him.

Perry, he was sure, had probably already come up with some clever way to escape. He could break through the bars easily, or, because of his small stature, squeeze through the air vent to get out. Heck, if he felt like, Perry could bust right through the wall and run for his life through the streets. He was likely just waiting for a good opportunity- although usually, it never took him so long.

Oh, but Doofenshmirtz was convinced Perry would get out anyway, despite whatever LOVE MUFFIN threw at him. How could he not? His nemesis was so crafty, and no trap he had ever created had ever stopped him. In fact, most of them were escaped easily. Getting trapped was a daily experience anyway, and so was escaping- so if Doofenshmirtz knew his nemesis, he'd probably be out by the end of the day. Then he'd probably go into hiding with the Rebellion, and start trying to rebuild it. And, in the back of Doofenshmirtz's mind, there was a tiny hope that maybe, just maybe, he'd still find the time to break into D.E.I. for a good, old-fashioned showdown. Any doubts about that were strictly forbidden- for this hope was like a small ember, so close to burning out that he could hardly think of it without weakening the flame. And in the midst of such confusing, uncertain circumstances, he needed its warmth.

"Sir? We're ready for you to visit him."

Doofenshmirtz looked up and saw a guard standing in the doorway, dressed in the usual coal-black uniform and wearing a pair of dark shades (indoors, strangely enough- sometimes Doofenshmirtz wondered if being in charge was getting to the minions very much). Giving a quick nod, he stood up and followed the man out, through long hallways lit by the same fluorescent bulbs as had been in the waiting room. The hallways themselves showed occasional signs of disrepair, such as peeling paint or a crack in the baseboard, and Doofenshmirtz recalled briefly that the building was rather old. It had served as a jail for who knew how long- since Danville's founding, it seemed- and LOVE MUFFIN hadn't cared to renovate it. That and the near silence, aside from their echoing footsteps, gave it an eerie atmosphere, and Doofenshmirtz couldn't help but feel a little unnerved once more.

It wasn't long until they passed another room, which was guarded by two men holding large stunning guns. They saluted Doofenshmirtz as he passed, and he waved awkwardly. Peering into the room, he saw a great many people sitting at desks with dividers between them, talking on phones and looking longingly through glass windows positioned on the walls in front of them. On the other side of these windows, prisoners sat with phones of their own, many staring longingly at their visitors with lonely expressions. Suddenly, Doofenshmirtz remembered that LOVE MUFFIN had recently raised taxes- again- and due to them being far too high, many people couldn't pay. These people were subsequently imprisoned, despite the fault laying not with them, but with LOVE MUFFIN itself. These people were probably completely innocent citizens who had never done any wrong, and were likely being visited by loved ones. A sense of despair hung in the air in the room, and Doofenshmirtz instantly began to feel very out of place. Sensing that his presence was neither needed nor desired, he ducked his head and followed the guard away, trying to remain inconspicuous. The last thing he wanted was a horde of angry citizens to deal with.

At last, they arrived at another visiting room, and Doofenshmirtz was escorted inside briskly. This one was obviously for high-security prisoners, because the door was a very solid-looking metal reinforced with many thick bolts, and there were cameras everywhere. At least five very tough-looking guards stood around it, three inside and two outside, and the window through which he would be speaking to Perry looked incredibly thick. There was an old-fashioned red telephone hung on the wall, which would clearly serve as their only means of communication. But as he observed this, something else occurred to him.

"Oh, I nearly forgot," he spoke up, catching the attention of his escort. "Um, Perry the Platypus doesn't have that Translator-Inator anymore, does he?"

The guard thought for a moment, then shook his head. "No, sir. Prisoners are not allowed to have anything they could use for malicious purposes. Why?"

"Well, he's a _platypus,_" Doofenshmirtz prompted, as if it were obvious. "He doesn't speak, remember? How am I supposed to talk to him?"

The guard shrugged indifferently, with a bored air. "I don't know, sir."

Doofenshmirtz snorted, rather irritated. "Look, I happen to have another Translator-Inator with me, and I need to talk to him. Could you let him have it just this once?"

The man looked very disapproving. His colleagues looked rather interested. "Well, I don't know, sir," he said stiffly. "He is an agent, you know. Give him so much as a spoon, and he could probably knock someone out cold."

Doofenshmirtz rolled his eyes. "Trust me, buddy, he could knock somebody out _without _the spoon. I would know, he's done it before." Then, gaining a devilish glint in his eye, he continued slyly, "You know, if you guys let it slip just this once, I may just mention you to the council…say what a good job you're doing, you know, maybe get you a raise…"

The guards' eyes widened. One of them whispered excitedly to another, "Sweet! All we have to do is be in a room with one of the leaders, and we get a raise!"

His friend gave a shrill, "Squee!" for a reply.

The other guard gave it a bit of thought, clearly interested. "Hmm," he murmured pensively, not entirely convinced yet. "How big a raise are we talking?"

Doofenshmirtz took a moment to think about that, decide he had no idea, and then answer succinctly, "BIG."

At this, the guard's eyes went even wider. Doofenshmirtz took the little device out of his pocket and fingered it temptingly, and the man cracked. "I'll give it to him right away, sir," he said obediently, taking the device and running off. The other guards all gave each other high fives, and Doofenshmirtz smirked in satisfaction. Despite it being totally immoral, money and power really could get you anywhere in this world- and since evil and immoral went hand in hand, that was fine by LOVE MUFFIN.

Then, having achieved his wish, he walked to the desk that sat by the window and took a seat there, peering through the glass curiously. No one was there yet- he assumed the guard was still busy giving Perry the Translator-Inator- but it wasn't long before a door on the other side of the room opened, and he was led inside.

(Music time! :D Go look this up: Majora's Mask: Time's End)

The first thing Doofenshmirtz noticed about him was that he had been allowed his hat back, in order to wear the Translator-Inator properly, and he was wearing it low over his eyes so you couldn't see them. The rest of him looked relatively normal- although his fur was a little ruffled, as if he'd been in a fight (which, of course, he had). He walked with a defeated but defiant step, followed closely by a guard, and as he approached the window, he disappeared from sight for a moment as the wall blocked him from view. Then the guard placed a soap box on the chair so he could look properly through the glass window, and he climbed up and sat quietly for a moment. The guard left to stand in the corner of the room, and they were silent for a moment. Then Doofenshmirtz took a quick preparatory breath and picked up the telephone. A moment later, Perry looked up and did the same.

The moment he looked up, it was clear that he had been terribly upset by something. The fur around his eyes glistened very subtly, as if it were wet, and the eyes themselves were no better. He wouldn't look at his nemesis, and that defiance was as evident as it had been a few hours ago, at the scene of his capture. It had hardly been two hours since then, but already he seemed more stressed- and with the stonily set face he wore, it was clear that he was trying to contain that stress. Doofenshmirtz wondered briefly if coming to talk to him had been such a good idea- he did seem awfully upset- but quickly brushed the thought aside and held the phone to his ear.

"Um…hi, Perry the Platypus."

Perry didn't answer, despite obviously being able to hear his nemesis. He didn't even look up, eyes locked on the desk before him.

Doofenshmirtz waited a moment, during which nothing happened, and then tried again tentatively. "Are you, uh…are you okay?" he asked.

Again, Perry did not show any sign that he had heard the doctor; but he did give a tiny, nearly inaudible snort of disdain. Such an understatement deserved no response from him. Doofenshmirtz gulped uncomfortably. This wasn't going well…

Frowning in a frustrated manner, the doctor leaned back in his chair. "Look, Perry," he began sternly, foregoing the full name for the sake of brevity. "This is probably the only visit you're going to get, and it's definitely the only time you'll get to wear that Translator-Inator. Can't you at least look at me?"

Perry was silent, and he didn't move. Doofenshmirtz mirrored the silence, staring at him as if he could will him to look up. At last, there came a soft sigh from the other end of the phone, and Perry spoke at last.

"…Hello, Doctor," he began blandly, not showing any more emotion than was necessary. "Things are finally back to normal, aren't they?" His voice sounded cracked and unused, and his gaze was locked on the desk before him. "I'm trapped with no hope of escape, and you're here, no doubt, to gloat over my imminent doom."

He gave a dry, sarcastic laugh. "Yeah, I'm sure this is exactly what you wanted. After all, the best part of the scheme is when I'm trapped and your plan is working, right?"

Doofenshmirtz listened with a frown, seeing that his nemesis was clearly not in a good mood. When Perry had finished speaking, he argued, "Hey, you don't think I _planned _this, do you? Because I wasn't in on it at all, they didn't tell me _anything_-"

Perry interrupted just then, cutting him off with an icy indifference. "Look, don't try to get out of it. It only makes things more complicated," he told his nemesis coldly. "I already know the whole plan, and no excuse of yours will change it." And without waiting, he re-explained the whole thing. "LOVE MUFFIN had access to OWCA files- they could easily have found out about my family. After they tried to visit their sister, they were identified as the rebel leaders, and you hatched a plan to destroy us all at once.

"So you brought me out of a time spiral, pretending to be on my side and even saving my life a few times, and basically let me lead you to my family, as you knew I would. From there, it was probably easy to track us down and capture the whole lot…and I know the rest of the story from there." He stared at the somewhat speechless Doofenshmirtz through the glass, brows knit and mouth set firmly. Clearly, he hated the situation- but he had too much self-control to show the true anger that boiled within him. It showed in his eyes, which shone and burned and remained calm all at the same time, as if a hidden passion lay within them. Doofenshmirtz's first reaction was to wonder why Rodney couldn't be so brief in his explanations. Then he gulped, and began to try to explain.

"Perry the Platypus, I know you're probably really mad at me, but you've got to listen," he entreated, as Perry looked away in exasperation. "I wasn't in on this one, honestly- and I definitely didn't bring you back just to get rid of you! What's the point in that? You're just suspicious, that's what it is, and I'm not-"

"Oh, _I'm _just suspicious," Perry retorted, glaring at his nemesis hotly. "Sure, it's my fault now that I'm locked up and on the verge of destruction, doomed by the same organization you're in charge of! No, of course it's not your fault. Why don't we just let it go and be best friends for the rest of forever?" He sounded bored with a satirical edge to his voice, and he obviously didn't believe a word Doofenshmirtz said.

Nonetheless, the doctor tried again, determined to make his point this time. "I'm serious, Perry the Platypus!" he protested, scowling now. "I mean, aside from me bringing you back on purpose, you've pretty much got the plan right- but I wasn't in on it, and I honestly had no idea LOVE MUFFIN was doing it!" But the moment he paused, Perry took the opportunity to speak again, no more convinced than he had been before.

"Yeah, I definitely believe that," he said, narrowing his eyes angrily. "Although I don't know why you're still trying to get back on my good side, when you know perfectly well that I can see right through your flimsy lies."

"Lies!" Doofenshmirtz exclaimed, quite offended. "I'm not lying! I'm a terrible liar, remember? You know that!"

"And what if that's a lie, too?" Perry interjected, scowling resentfully now. Doofenshmirtz stopped in his tracks with a stunned expression, as the truth of the words sunk in. Perry was right…

"A true liar can lie about anything at all, pretend to be whoever they like," Perry continued coolly, examining some obscure feature of the desk before him. "For instance, a total moron, bad liar, and wannabe evil scientist."

Of course, Doofenshmirtz bristled at this description, but Perry interrupted him before he could retort. "I mean, think about it," he told the evil scientist, now looking directly at him. "After everything that happened today, after everything that you've done- what reason do I have to believe you anymore?"

Doofenshmirtz frowned once more, casting his gaze away from Perry's piercing stare. A small sigh came through the other end of the phone.

"…You know, there was a time when I almost would have believed you."

The statement caught his attention instantly, but he didn't look up, for fear of causing Perry to fall silent once more. He continued anyway, in a tired voice.

"That night at Vanessa's," he said wearily, "I had a lot of time to think. And I started thinking maybe…just maybe…we could work together." He paused for a moment, then snorted at the ridiculous idea. "Of course, the thought was quashed relatively fast."

Doofenshmirtz, however, took that into consideration. Everyone seemed to think that they had either been working together or considering it, but truthfully, he had never stopped to think about such things. Why he had clung to his nemesis so unyieldingly over the past few days, he didn't know- but as for Perry, he had thought that the secret agent was just barely putting up with him. Apparently, that was not quite the case.

"Then, after those minions chased us in the car- I mean, Norm," Perry continued, "the idea came back, and it occurred to me that we had been working together the whole time." At this, he grimaced and muttered resentfully, "We…ugh, I hate myself for this, but…we actually made a good team."

He really did sound resentful, as if he felt he had to say it but couldn't stand to do so. Doofenshmirtz, at this point, could not help but look back up at him, and when he did, he saw that Perry was once more looking to the side, his face shadowed darkly by his hat. There was a bitter grimace resting on his face, and his eyes were narrowed in an angry, hurt way. At last, he spoke once more, rather ruefully.

"I know it was only me that felt like that, too," he mentioned, sounding rather disgusted with himself. "It would be stupid to think that you'd agree…but somehow, despite our status as mortal enemies, I just had this feeling that we were in it together, somehow united against a common enemy." Here he gave a dry laugh. "Funny how adversity can bring people together…and then, the minute that adversity is gone, they betray each other without a second thought."

Doofenshmirtz opened his mouth to try to convince Perry that he _had _felt the same way, but suddenly stopped. Perry already thought he was lying, and to say that he had felt like that would be a real lie. Surely, it wouldn't help him to stay quiet- but to speak up would only hurt.

So for the moment, he held his tongue, and Perry resumed his speech.

"Then there was the whole Rebellion incident, and I came to visit you in the jail. You…you were just playing with me, weren't you?" He glanced back at his nemesis, eyes shining once more and fists clenched weakly. Doofenshmirtz merely stared back, not sure what to say, as the secret agent continued to speak. "I was at my weakest then…so convinced, so unsuspecting, so…_vulnerable_." He sighed heavily, a bitter edge to the sound. "I should have seen the signs. I should have listened to their warnings. Ever since I first arrived here, everyone kept acting like you had changed so much in this future, like you were really something to fear now. And I ignored them…" he took a deep breath again, and added, "I ignored them, because I thought I knew you better than they did."

Doofenshmirtz heard the pain in his voice, and was just beginning to fully understand the sorrow- but all he could think was that Perry had it wrong. "Perry the Platypus, you _do _know me better than anyone else!" he protested, in a softer tone than before. "And I know that you know I would never-"

"Well, maybe it is true, then!" Perry interrupted angrily (he seemed to be doing that an awful lot lately; Doofenshmirtz attributed it to frustration). "Maybe I do know you better than anyone else! And you know what? Because of that, I should have seen this coming. I should have kept my guard up. I should have trusted my instincts, that kept me alive all these years; I should have trusted my family, who loved me enough to sacrifice themselves." Here, he looked Doofenshmirtz in the eyes with an angry, hurt, offended gaze. "And above all," he finished, in a deathly quiet voice, "I shouldn't have trusted you."

Cold, inevitable silence draped itself over the room. Doofenshmirtz was temporarily lost for words, staring anxiously through the window at his now-silent enemy. Perry had finished talking for the moment, and he had also directed that piercing, despairing glare away from the doctor. However, that didn't make things any less tense- the air was filled with anxiety now, each of them silently wondering and worrying about their individual cares. The atmosphere was so thickly uncomfortable, it was almost tangible- and Doofenshmirtz knew that if it continued like that, the visit would be over in no time. Perry would return to his sulking unaltered, and he didn't know _what _he would do once he returned home. Now didn't seem a good time to think about it, either- instead, he tried to think of any possible way to connect with Perry, any crazy idea that could possibly have an effect on him.

At last, he simply decided to ask a question. "But, Perry the Platypus, this can't be the end for you," he said, having every confidence that it was so. "Can't you just break out of here whenever you feel like?"

At this, Perry laughed derisively, showing no real mirth at all. "Of course I could!" he said dully, as though it were obvious. "I can break any bars they put around me. I could beat up every guard in here and get out unscathed. I could be out of this place in thirty seconds flat, and you'd all be wondering where I went; but no matter what I did, it would all be in vain."

Doofenshmirtz was confused. "Well…how come, if you're so powerful and all?"

Perry frowned, clearly troubled. "Because if I make the smallest move," he explained quietly, "They'll hurt my family."

Perry shook his head, eyes downcast once more. "I'll do anything to prevent that…even if it means sitting here as a helpless prisoner."

"But it's your job to protect Danville or whatever," Doofenshmirtz pointed out halfheartedly.

"It _was _my job," Perry answered, "and I would have done the same then, too…" Then he frowned, looking somewhat uncomfortable. "Look, I don't want to talk about this."

Sensing that it would cause another fight if he continued, Doofenshmirtz instead tried a different tactic. He took a quick breath. "Perry the Platypus, I don't think the readers would like it if you just gave up here. I mean, really, we're barely halfway through this fic-"

"Stop," Perry commanded suddenly, sounding very angry by now. Doofenshmirtz was so surprised by this, he actually did. "Do you hear that?"

They were both silent for a moment, as Perry listened for some obscure sound that apparently only he could hear. At last, with the most dry voice you ever heard, he said, "That was the fourth wall. You just shattered it."

Doofenshmirtz rolled his eyes, rather riled now. "Oh, a room only needs three walls to stand, anyway! What I'm trying to tell you is that you _can't _give up!"

"You're lying again," Perry responded sharply, anger building in his voice. "It's some kind of trap. It always is!"

"It's not! It's different this time!" Doofenshmirtz argued, trying desperately to make Perry see his point. "I'm not lying, I swear! You have to listen to me!"

"No, I don't!" Perry retorted, narrowing his eyes furiously. "I've listened to you every scheme, every day, year after year, without a single break! I'm sick of it!"

He sounded quite sincere, and his voice was raised in volume considerably. However, as hurtful as the statement was, Doofenshmirtz tried to swallow it and continue. "I know things look bad, but I could probably work something out with LOVE MUFFIN. I…I could convince the council to let you live, work out a schedule for a regular showdown every day, just like the old days-!"

But clearly, Perry had had enough. "I don't _care!_" he yelled, making the mad scientist jump out of his seat, clutching the phone in alarm. "I don't care about old days!" he shouted, fists clenched tightly. "That was yesterday for me, and I don't miss it at all. You're living in a dream, Heinz- nothing is ever going to be normal again. _Nothing. _The future was ours to mould, but you and the rest of your stupid organization crushed that future and threw it in the trash!"

Perry's voice had raised to such an extent that you could almost hear it right through the glass, and as he continued to shout at his somewhat shocked nemesis, the guards looked up in alarm. Clearly, the prisoner was incredibly upset- his teeth were bared, his fists were clenched, and his eyes were sparkling wetly now. Doofenshmirtz was wearing an expression that seemed to be a cross between fear, anger, and sadness, and he listened silently as his nemesis let everything out in a huge whirlwind of long-held emotions.

"You have no right to talk about me escaping, because it's your fault that I'm in here in the first place," he growled, narrowing his eyes. The fur around them began to glisten brightly, but he either didn't notice or didn't care. "In fact, everything in this future is your fault! This never would have happened if you hadn't built that stupid Time Transporter-Inator, and your plan just made it worse."

"Look, I didn't know that the TTI would do what it did!" Doofenshmirtz protested in vain, still holding on to a tiny hope that was fading fast. "Heck, I don't even know why I built it anymore! Can't I just say I'm sorry and be done with it?"

But the moment he said the last part, there was a sharp gasp on the other end of the line, and Perry's face suddenly fell. The anger disappeared; there was only pain now, an intense disappointment that took over his features.

"You…" he started weakly, suddenly drained of all energy, "you never…y-you still don't know…"

Doofenshmirtz fell silent, taking note of the sudden change in attitude, and wondered what in the world he could have said that would induce such an effect. "What? I still don't know _what?_"

Perry seemed so lost, so despairing, that he could hardly get his answer out. "That day, eight years ago…you still don't know what it was, do you?"

Doofenshmirtz just stared at him, his confused and worried gaze meeting Perry's shining dark brown eyes. He did not reply; he couldn't. It was an important day, he knew…after all, he had been building something big just for this occasion…

But eight years was long enough to blur his memory considerably, and even as he tried desperately to remember, no answer came. He closed his eyes, unable to meet Perry's anymore, and gave no response.

A few moments passed, during which neither of them spoke. Doofenshmirtz sat completely still, listening to the sound of Perry's uneven breathing on the other end of the phone. Around them, the world had fallen silent- all five guards had now clustered into the room and were staring at them with stunned expressions, remaining as quiet as possible, and several more were outside. No one moved. No one spoke. For that matter, no one did anything.

At last, a dragging breath came from the red plastic phone that Doofenshmirtz still clutched against his ear. Perry's voice spoke a final time, choked and dismal.

"…This visit is over."

And with that, the phone was hung up; the chair was dismounted; and with a light pattering of tiny, flat feet, he was gone. Doofenshmirtz glanced up once more to try and catch a last glimpse of him- but the only thing left to see was Perry's familiar brown fedora with the Translator-Inator perched on its seared and tattered rim, abandoned on the desk he had sat at not a moment ago.

A sudden wave of regret hit him as he hung up the phone got out of the chair. His sense of right and wrong was in complete turmoil, and he knew exactly who to blame for it- that is, he _would _blame him if his sense of right and wrong hadn't been in complete turmoil.

By now, the guards had run back to their positions as if they'd been there the whole time, and Doofenshmirtz didn't notice anything odd as he began to leave the room.

"What did I say?" he asked them sadly, still rather confused.

A few shrugged; one answered, "I got nothing." Doofenshmirtz sighed, quite defeated and at a loss of what to do. Perry was right; everything he had once known was gone. To believe he could bring it all back by transporting his nemesis to a future such as this was foolish, and he knew that now. And now, because of all the things he'd done, he had ruined not only Danville's future, but his own…

It was like that moment when you've just built a huge card tower, and it all falls apart at the tiniest breath of wind. You wonder whether you should start again, and if so, where to start? Somehow, the first cards have to be stacked. So, at last, Doofenshmirtz let one of the guards lead him out of the building, without a thought of how he was going to continue or what he was going to do. He just walked.

It was all he could do…

* * *

><p>Elsewhere, two completely different people had just happened to turn on their televisions at the same time, just in time to see the news.<p>

"That's right, Danville, we have had a great triumph today," the reporter said briskly, his face as blank and indifferent as ever. "Several of the most dangerous criminals of our time have just been apprehended and imprisoned."

In one house, the occupant looked up from the dishes she was attempting to wash (she never usually had to), wearing a slightly concerned scowl. "Oh, please don't let that be about Dad…"

"The first to be caught was the last agent of the OWCA, Agent P, who is highly dangerous. He is now being held in high security prison, and citizens will no longer have to worry about him." And a mug shot of Perry flashed across the screen.

Vanessa gasped. "Oh, no…" It had happened; they had been caught. She was sure the reporter was going to say her father's name next- but instead, he mentioned two completely unexpected people. "Also captured were rebel leaders Phineas Flynn and Ferb Fletcher, eighteen, who were preparing to launch an attack on LOVE MUFFIN when they were apprehended." And the boys' pictures flashed across the screen as well, side-by-side. Vanessa blinked in surprise.

"Hey," she said to herself, looking at the green-haired boy on the screen. "Ferb…? I know him…"

* * *

><p>In another household, the pictures had had a much more serious effect on the young, orange-haired woman who was watching in her kitchen. Beside her, her husband put an arm around her comfortingly, quite alarmed, as she stared at the screen in horror.<p>

"That's them, all right," she confirmed, staring at the screen as her brothers' pictures flashed by.

"It was," her husband agreed grimly. "But, before that, was that-?" With that, the announcer began to talk about that LOVE MUFFIN official that had supposedly gone rogue, and Candace stopped listening.

"Oh, Jeremy, what are we gonna do?" she asked, turning to her husband in a panic. "My brothers have finally been found, and they're in jail!" Then she paused and added, "Not to mention, they started a whole rebellion and didn't let me help!"

"Don't worry, Candace," Jeremy said, although he looked rather concerned himself. "They were already clever boys when they disappeared, and they've probably only gotten more clever. They'll find a way out of this."

Candace was silent for a moment, then nodded. "Yeah, I'm sure, but still…"

Jeremy looked hard at her, then gave a small smile. "You want to go help them, don't you?"

Candace returned the smile slowly, gradually gaining a determined expression. "Oh, yeah," she answered. "Nobody busts _my _brothers but me!"

_To be continued…_

* * *

><p>TTOTT<p>

*wail* IMSOSORRYYYY

(Oh, and a random note; I swear that's the last time anybody breaks the fourth wall. So I can stop annoying you now. ^-^)

I'm gonna go cry in a corner now...thanks for reading, I swear it'll get better next time!


	17. The Chicks Hatch a Plan

**Author's notes: **This one is really late. :( I'm so sorry about that. But at least I didn't have to postpone it for as long as I thought I'd have to!  
>Besides, it premiered on my sixteenth birthday, so I'm happy. ^-^<p>

This one will be much more humorous than the last one, so it should be a nice break from all the melodramatic stuff that's going on. I hope you guys will like it!

* * *

><p>"Hi, you've reached Dr. Doofenshmirtz. I'm not here right now, so if you don't happen to be a normal, annoying citizen or my brother, leave a message."<p>

Vanessa let out a quick, irritated breath. She hadn't expected her father to pick up the first time, as he usually let it ring, but this was the second call, and still he did not answer. Apparently he hadn't gotten home yet from wherever LOVE MUFFIN toted him off to, which was a problem for her. After seeing that upsetting news report, she had decided to call him and get the whole story from a (somewhat) reliable source, in order to better understand what had happened- and, possibly, help out somehow. But she couldn't do that if he couldn't pick up his phone, which he was apparently incapable of doing at the moment. And she was willing to bet that wherever he was, he had forgotten his cell phone as well, which would make it even harder to reach him.

The phone emitted a loud beep, and she spoke into it. "Dad, it's me, Vanessa," she said. "Call me back, okay? It's about…what happened today."

With that, she set the phone back down with a frown, then took a seat at the sunlit kitchen table and considered her options. One; she could simply sit and wait for him to call her back, which might take a few minutes- or, knowing her father, a few hours. Two; she could drive to Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated and find him herself, which she wasn't keen on doing. Over the past few years, he hadn't bothered to keep the building very clean, unless his maid did it for him, and it had an unpleasant sort of smell- like a mix of burnt popcorn, chemicals, and old socks (not that it had smelled particularly better in past years).

The third option was that she could go visit Perry or Ferb, which seemed like a relatively good idea. If she couldn't get the story from her father, she could get it from the one other person- er, platypus- who had seen it all, and probably understood it better than Doofenshmirtz ever could. As for Ferb, she hadn't seen him in years, and a little catching up couldn't hurt.

Giving the third option a deeper consideration, she glanced up at the phone thoughtfully. It sat silent and still in its post, undisturbed by calls from absent fathers, and with a small nod, she looked away from it and stood up. Perry could probably give a better account of the past few days anyway, and she would rather hear it from him besides. And so, in a very short time, she had fetched her coat and left the apartment, headed for the jail on the west side of town.

* * *

><p>It didn't take Vanessa long to arrive at the jail, which wasn't far away from her apartment. But unfortunately, as she stepped inside and requested to speak with Perry, her hopes were dashed.<p>

"Well, you can speak to him if you like, Miss Doofenshmirtz," the guard said thoughtfully, "But he can't speak to you, even if he wanted to."

Vanessa scowled, not easily discouraged. "Well, why not? Is something wrong with him?"

"Aside from his being extremely distressed, no," the guard answered calmly. "It's just that he's a platypus, miss. They don't do much, you know- and they definitely don't talk."

"Well, what about his translator?" Vanessa pressed. "Doesn't he have it?"

The guard shook his head. "Sorry, miss, but prisoners are not allowed items which could aid in their escape. Said translator has now been returned to Dr. Doofenshmirtz."

Vanessa glared at the man for a moment more, then sighed. "Fine, whatever." And, feeling slightly disappointed, she left the building sullenly. If Perry didn't even have his translator, then there was no point trying to talk to him- it would only turn into a one-sided conversation, and that was the last thing she needed.

As she stepped out into the parking lot, headed back to her glossy black Ferrari, Vanessa considered her options once more. She clearly wouldn't be able to speak to Perry, so he was out of the picture for the moment. As for her father, he might be home by now- and even if he wasn't, she hadn't tried calling his cell phone yet. Maybe, by some unlikely chance, he had taken it with him- but a quick check disproved that, and once more, all she got was the answering machine.

Groaning in frustration, she put the phone away and rested her head in her hands, elbows propped up against the dashboard of the currently unmoving car. Now she would either have to get a Translator-Inator for Perry from who-knew-where, or wait for her father to get home. Knowing how he got sometimes, that could take a while- and even when he did get home, he probably wouldn't check his messages. Not to mention, his building might still be destroyed from the explosion several days ago, and if that were the case, he might not be home for a long time.

But as she reflected on this, another thought occurred to her- although she couldn't talk to Perry or her father at the moment, there was someone who might be able to help her, if she could only get permission to talk to him. Considering her luck with Perry, her chances were slim- but it was worth a shot. And with a swift insertion of the keys, the sleek vehicle darted out of the parking lot, and she was off.

* * *

><p>The jail that Ferb was being held in was on the east side of town, so crossing from the west side took a while, but Vanessa made the trip nonetheless. It was a dismal gray building, no better furnished than its western twin, and the sight of it sent a shiver down her spine as she approached. Frowning down on everyone who passed, the place looked silent and forbidding, and it was the last place she would have thought to look for boys like Phineas and Ferb.<p>

She parked the car next to an old, auburn red station wagon and hopped out, her heels tapping against the asphalt as she strode into the building and her mind swirling with questions. The heavy door creaked as it opened, and inside she saw a small lobby with the same fluorescent lighting as in the other building. A few chairs sat by the far left wall, a locked door lay to the right, and straight ahead was a small desk, at which a tough-looking guard sat. Standing in front of the desk and seemingly arguing with the guard was a young, orange-haired woman in a red and white dress. From her standing point behind the girl, Vanessa couldn't see her expression- but she could hear the anger in her tone quite clearly.

"Listen, pal, I _need _to get in there!" the woman exclaimed hotly, obviously quite upset. The guard, who looked only mildly annoyed, simply shook his head.

"Sorry, miss, but no one can see those two without proper authorization," he told her calmly, a tinge of irritation in his deep, gruff voice.

"But it's really important! You've got to let me!" she argued, now slightly hysterical. The man's eyes narrowed slightly, and Vanessa sensed danger.

"No, _you _listen, missy," he began sternly, pointing at her with one thick finger. "Nobody's goin' in there, and that's final! Now why don't you skedaddle before I-!"

"Before you get fired?"

The man looked up at the door with a slightly surprised expression, and the orange-haired woman whirled around, eyes wide. Vanessa stood in the doorway, framed by the natural light behind her, one hand on her hip and a sulky expression on her face.

"Because I can do that, y'know," she pointed out calmly, watching as the guard's eyes widened just a bit. "And I'm sure we don't want that, now, do we…"

The man shook his head quickly, seeming surprised by the young woman's very presence. "N-no, Miss Doofenshmirtz. Very sorry. Is there something I can do for you?"

"Maybe," Vanessa said, stepping inside and turning her attention to the now very shocked girl in front of the counter. "I know you- Candace, right? Your brothers gave me a lift from Tokyo to Paris once, remember?"

Candace's eyes widened a bit more as she recognized her brown-haired friend, and she exclaimed, "Oh! Vanessa, is that you?" Then, giving her a quick examination, she mused, "Wow, eight years really is a long time, isn't it?"

"Sure is," Vanessa agreed, a smile creeping onto her lips. "Especially if you're running a rebellion single-handedly at the age of eighteen."

At this, Candace gasped. "Oh, yeah! Phineas and Ferb- you saw the news about them, didn't you?"

Vanessa nodded grimly. "Mm-hm. Are you here to visit them, too?"

"Yeah," said Candace, looking slightly downhearted now. "But they won't let me in!"

"Hmm…" Vanessa murmured thoughtfully. Then, gaining a small smile, she said, "Well, I may have a solution to that, if you're interested…"

Candace perked up instantly. "Like what?"

Of course, Vanessa did not hesitate to explain. "Don't hate me, but my dad is actually on the LOVE MUFFIN council, so I basically have free reign around here. Besides, I was actually headed over to talk to Phineas and Ferb anyway- so how would it be if we went in to see them together?"

At this, Candace broke into a thankful grin. "That would be great! But can you really get us in?"

"Oh, yeah- just watch," Vanessa said with a smirk. Turning back to the guard, who had been listening quietly to the entire exchange with a half confused, half scared expression, she produced a card bearing her name and credentials from her pocket. Then she showed it to the wide-eyed man, handing it to him to examine it closer. "I have the proper authorization, so let us in."

The man examined the card closely, then nodded. "Y-yes, ma'am. Right away."

Candace stared in awe, mouth open slightly, as Vanessa gained a satisfied smile. "So," she said casually, "how have you been?"

* * *

><p>The next few minutes were spent in casual talk, catching up, and discussion about the state of the Tri-State Area as they waited for admittance to the visiting room. Perhaps the two girls had never been particularly good friends, but they certainly seemed like it now; the dark waiting room was warmed by their good-natured chatter, and it seemed illuminated by more than just the harsh fluorescent light bulb that sputtered on the ceiling. Then, in the midst of a heated discussion about shoes, a guard came to the doorway and announced that the boys were ready to see them.<p>

They were lead down a narrow hallway and through a door, and at last arrived in a small box of a room, identical to the one Doofenshmirtz had talked to Perry in. Only one phone hung on the wall beside the porthole-like window, but it would have to do, for if you wanted to talk to two of the highest-security prisoners LOVE MUFFIN had, there was no other choice.

Candace took a seat in the chair, while Vanessa chose to stand behind her, and they waited for a moment. Candace's excitement was almost electric, a tingling pulse that swept through the room, and it was impossible to be unaffected by it. Though they waited for only a few moments, it seemed like hours- until at last, a door in the room behind the window opened, and the boys were led inside by a guard.

Candace caught her breath as she saw them, her eyes sparkling in an awed manner. Both of them looked a little distressed- their hair was a mess, and the rebel uniforms they still wore were covered in dirt and grass stains from their struggle with LOVE MUFFIN. But nonetheless, Phineas wore a huge grin, and Ferb's usually emotionless outlook was replaced by a small smile of his own. Both of them ran towards the window happily, and Phineas grabbed the phone off of the wall.

"Candace!" he exclaimed jubilantly, pressing his nose against the glass in a childish manner. "Candace, it's so great to see you again!"

"Phineas, Ferb!" Candace cried gleefully, tears in her eyes as Phineas' static-filled voice reached her ears through the telephone. "Oh, I missed you two so much!"

"We missed you too, Candace!" Phineas replied, a spark of regret in his eyes. "I'm sorry we had to meet this way- you know, in jail and all. This definitely wasn't part of our plan…" Beside him, Ferb nodded emphatically. However, Candace's eyes narrowed slightly, and her elated smile turned into a somewhat stern frown.

"Yeah, about that- what's up with the whole rebellion thing?" she demanded. "Why didn't you tell me about that? I could have helped!"

Phineas shrunk back a bit, obviously quite ashamed of himself. "Oh, Candace, I'm so sorry about that. In the beginning, Ferb and I thought you'd be safer at home, away from fighting and stuff- but later, we realized that you probably weren't too happy about our disappearance, not to mention we missed you like crazy. So we tried to visit you, but we almost got caught, so we gave it up. I'm sorry we didn't get in contact with you after that, but we were worried that you'd get in trouble- and besides, you seemed so happy with Jeremy that it seemed a pity to ruin it. I hope you're not too angry at us, sis…" With his large, sparkling dark blue eyes and his downcast gaze, he was the picture of remorse.

As he spoke, Candace's expression softened gradually, and her eyes began to sparkle with unshed tears once more. Even she could not stay angry at her brothers after such a speech, even through all the times they had driven her crazy as kids. A touched smile began to spread across her face, and she wiped her eyes.

"Angry?" she said softly, causing Phineas to look up. Her smile widened a bit as she said, "No, silly, I'm not angry. That's just what people do when they're worried sick."

Phineas stared at her for a moment, then broke into a thankful grin himself. Beside him, Ferb gave the thumbs up with a small sniff.

Just then, Vanessa, who had been listening the whole exchange with a slightly dubious frown, spoke up from her position beside the phone. "Hey, wait. What about Ferb? You're the only one who can actually hear us. Don't you have to tell him what we're saying or something?"

Phineas shook his head, his usual cheery mood returning quickly. "Oh, no- Ferb has super hearing!"

Vanessa raised an eyebrow, and was about to point out that surely Ferb could not hear through glass, when Phineas added, "Not to mention he reads lips!"

Vanessa's eyes widened. "Oh. Well…wow."

Phineas nodded, seeming quite proud of his brother, and Candace rolled her eyes with the same kind of proud smile. Beside him, Ferb said something that they couldn't hear, and he translated, "Ferb says, 'Wow, indeed.'"

Vanessa took that chance to get a better look at Ferb, who had certainly gotten older (and cuter) since she last saw him- and she might have commented on that if Candace had not spoken up just then. "Okay, now I have a question," she said, having somewhat regained her composure. "What _happened?_ I need a full explanation of what you two have been up to! And when we're done, I might call Mom about it."

"Oh, speaking of that, how is Mom?" Phineas asked conversationally. "Is she okay over in Britain?"

"Yeah, she is," Candace answered, forgetting her original question for the moment. "I still can't believe LOVE MUFFIN wouldn't let her come back to Danville after she and Dad left to visit Uncle Adrian!"

"I know!" Phineas agreed. "It's a crazy world, Candace- well, more like a crazy Tri-State Area."

Candace raised an eyebrow. "Wait, how would you even know about that?"

Phineas' answer was cryptic, simple, and effective. "One word; Ferb."

Vanessa cocked her head in confusion, and Candace opened her mouth to ask, but she immediately shook it off and said hesitantly, "O-kaaay…not even gonna ask."

"It's probably best not to," Phineas agreed with a smile. Ferb nodded quietly, a sort of knowing look in his eyes. "So," Phineas continued, "you wanted the whole story, right?"

Candace nodded, and he frowned for a moment, as if trying to imagine where to begin. "Well," he started, "I suppose the whole thing really starts with Perry."

"Perry?" Candace asked, gaining a saddened expression.

"Yeah, Perry- who, by the way, isn't missing anymore," said Phineas cheerfully, causing his sister to gasp slightly. Beside her, Vanessa suddenly realized that with all the things she and Candace had had to talk about, the topic of Perry had never come up, simply because she had forgotten to mention him. Well, it was probably best if Phineas explained, anyway.

"You see, Candace," explained Phineas, "Perry has a secret- or, more correctly, _had _a secret. He's not just your average mindless domestic pet…he's a secret agent!"

At this, Candace stared in disbelief. "You're…you're kidding."

Phineas shook his head, still grinning happily. "Nope, not kidding! Isn't it awesome?"

Candace, rather than being excited, ran a hand through her hair with a groan. "Oh, this is going to be really crazy, isn't it?"

Phineas just nodded calmly. "Yes. Yes, it is."

* * *

><p>The story was indeed crazy, and long- but Phineas knew just how to sum things up without missing a detail, and kept the story interesting all the time. As they listened, Candace and Vanessa gasped, cheered, and 'aww'd at all the right moments, much like the boys themselves had done when they heard it from Perry. At some point, Ferb's eyes welled with tears, and everyone had to try to console him before Phineas could continue with the tale. And yet, once he had finished it, only a mere ten minutes had passed.<p>

Having heard the tale, Candace sat back in her chair and sighed. Vanessa just shook her head, amazed by the complexity of the story. Phineas took a deep breath, tired from all the talking he had had to do, and added, "Any questions?"

Candace, still looking rather bewildered, raised her hand. "Um, just lemme get this straight," she said slowly. "Perry's a secret agent, and he was working together with an evil pharmacist who he fights all the time."

Phineas nodded. "So far, so good."

"But then the pharmacist betrayed him," Candace continued confusedly, "and because of that, the Rebellion is scattered and you guys are in jail."

Phineas grinned. "Yup, Ferb, I think she's got it."

Surprisingly, the fact that her seemingly missing pet was a secret agent and currently imprisoned in jail was not what concerned Candace. "Okay, so I guess that part makes sense…sort of," she said, frowning. "But what I don't get is, why haven't you two broken out yet?"

Phineas sighed. "Well, that's just it- we can't."

"What?" Candace exclaimed, clearly shocked by this. "But I thought you said you were master escapists or whatever! Think of all the stuff you've gotten out of before!"

Phineas shook his head. "No, no, Candace, it's not like that. It isn't that we aren't physically capable of getting out- because we could, if we wanted to- it's just that we're restrained by something else."

"Like what?" asked Vanessa curiously. "I've seen Ferb in action, and I find it hard to believe that anything could restrain him."

Ferb blushed lightly, but Phineas just continued in a somewhat unhappy tone. "It's not a physical restraint. In fact, if we ignored it, I don't think you would think very highly of us at all."

"Well, why not?" Candace demanded, clearly baffled. "What could possibly hold you guys back?"

Phineas sighed. "It's like this; if we try anything, they'll hurt Perry, and vice versa. So despite our being perfectly capable to do so…we can't escape."

The statement was met with a small bout of silence. Candace did not quite know what to say; Ferb heaved a quiet sigh; Vanessa wondered briefly how her father could allow such a thing. But, then again, he was evil. Perhaps it was to be expected…

At length, Candace spoke up again. "Well, that doesn't mean you can't escape at all, does it?" she whispered, trying not to be heard by the guards. Phineas considered for a moment, then shrugged.

"I don't know, Candace," he said quietly. "Security in this place is pretty high, and I don't just mean muscle. There are cameras _everywhere- _so even if they weren't threatening Perry, we'd be caught pretty quick. And even if we got out, where would we go? There are cameras all over Danville!" And he spread his arms out to show just how many cameras there were in Danville, accidentally dropping the phone in the process. Ferb picked it up and gave it back to him, and he gave an embarrassed thank you.

"And even if we could escape, we wouldn't stand a chance alone," Phineas continued, having retrieved the phone from Ferb. "Not without our troops, and a lot of them were captured, too."

Ferb's expression remained monotone, but had the other two been able to hear him, they would have heard him reply, "If only there were more of us."

Phineas' eyes suddenly sparkled, as if he had just recalled a distant memory. "Yeah, like that time we created android versions of ourselves," he remarked, cracking a grin. "We're Phinedroids and Ferbots, and we're stomping our feet…remember, Ferb?"

In response, Ferb smiled and performed a few robot dance moves. Phineas laughed, although it was a half-hearted laugh. "Yeah! That's it, Ferb!"

Candace rolled her eyes, although she seemed somewhat amused. "Gah, you two and your crazy inventions. I swear, it was never normal around here to begin with."

Vanessa, on the other hand, looked quite interested. "Android versions of yourselves?" she asked, intrigued. "You don't say…"

"Actually, I do say!" Phineas replied cheerfully, joining Ferb in his robotic antics. "We made them so they could help us get more projects done, but it kind of backfired. A whole week's worth of projects, finished without our taking part- and they all disappeared before we could do anything with them, too. Which is weird, because as far as I'm aware, a tunnel to the center of the Earth is not magnetic."

When his statement was met only with bewildered stares, he merely replied, "It's a long story."

After a moment, Vanessa seemed to brush that off and spoke again. "Okay…so, just out of curiosity, how did you make these?"

"Oh, easy," Phineas responded. "We used a fourth generation self-programmed android developer. It was _years _ago, of course, so the technology is far outdated by now- but it was pretty advanced at the time. Oh, Ferb, that's so cool!" Behind him, Ferb was allowing his arm to dangle childishly, earning a giggle from his brother. Phineas laughed and joined him, and from the view through the window, it might have seemed like two ordinary teenagers goofing off. Candace smiled longingly, as if she wished she was on the other side with them, doing silly robotic moves just for the heck of it. Strange how those two always had to look on the bright side- even though it was difficult to find one in this situation.

However, while Candace was amused by her brothers' levity, Vanessa had not forgotten the seriousness of their situation; and the mention of the brobots had sparked an idea in her mind. Real soldiers were fine and all- but robotic soldiers, crafted after the boys themselves, would be even better.

"Hey, Phineas," she said thoughtfully. "How strong would you say those robots are?"

Phineas thought for a moment as he marched in place. "Let's see, the Phinedroids are strong enough to lift heavy boxes and supplies…and the Ferbots are even stronger. So yeah, they're pretty tough."

"Can they fight?" Vanessa asked, smiling indicatively. Phineas was quiet for a moment, but a smile began to creep up onto his face.

"Probably," he answered in a low, excited voice. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"That depends on what you're thinking," Vanessa answered playfully.

"I think you think you know what I think I'm thinking," Ferb added rapidly, making Phineas snicker at the complexity of the statement.

Candace, on the other hand, clearly did not know what Ferb thought he was thinking. "What?" she demanded. "What are we thinking? What are you guys talking about?"

But before anyone could answer her, a guard came into the room and said gruffly, "Visiting hours are now over, Miss Doofenshmirtz. Sorry, but you and your friend will have to leave."

Vanessa frowned, clearly annoyed. "Fine. We can't discuss this here, anyway," she added in a lower tone. "But hang tight, you two- we've got a plan."

Phineas nodded, looking determined, and Ferb gave the thumbs up in a very mechanical fashion. Candace muttered something about how she could not possibly be part of the plan if she didn't know what the plan was, but she quickly abandoned that so she could say farewell to her brothers. Although each was sad to see the other go, there was a feeling of excitement in the air that somehow told them they would see each other again- and soon.

As the girls left, Phineas sighed and hung up the phone. Then he whispered, "Well, Ferb, I don't know how they're going to do it, but I have full confidence that we'll be out of here soon!" Here he paused and added, "Although, I do have one concern- were we really thinking the same thing back there?"

Ferb blinked. "Wallabies?"

There was silence for a moment, during which Phineas just stared with slightly wide eyes. Then, out of the blue, he grinned and said, "Oh, Ferb, you know me so well!"

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, Vanessa and Candace had left for the parking lot, in order to discuss things in a more private setting. Candace still had no idea what the other three had been talking about in the visiting room, but she had a feeling it was important, and she did not want to be kept in the dark any longer.<p>

"Okay, I'm lost," she confessed, as Vanessa began to stride back toward her car. "What are we doing? What's the plan? Was there something I missed?"

Vanessa sighed heavily, not particularly looking forward to explaining her idea. "Look, I can't say it here," she said in a loud whisper, "because they still have cameras all over, and we could get caught. But I'll tell you what you have to do."

Candace nodded, willing to help. "Okay, but can't you explain anything?"

"Not much, or we'll get caught," Vanessa said grimly. "Besides, everybody knows it's best not to explain plans before you do them, or they're jinxed."

Candace opened her mouth questioningly, as if she was about to ask about that, but Vanessa cut her off. "Anyway, all you have to do is get a picture of Phineas and Ferb. I'm going to my dad's place, to get something he made a long time ago. Bring the pictures, and we'll meet back here. Got it?"

Candace thought for a moment, trying to memorize the instructions. Then she nodded again, with a determined smile. "Got it. So are we doing this all alone?"

"Probably," Vanessa answered. "But it would be better to have three people doing it, not just two…"

"Oh, no problem!" said Candace happily. "I know just who can help!"

"Great!" said Vanessa, having reached her car now. Candace noticed it and gaped, awed by the gleaming black metal and sleek design. Vanessa merely lifted a panel on the surface metal, revealing a hand scanner, and placed her palm on it.

"In that case, we're all set," she said casually, as the scanner emitted a quick beep. The screen switched to a message reading, _Welcome back, Vanessa, _and she opened the door. " . Now, I'm off."

Candace nodded blankly, mouth still hanging open. "O-okay…"

Vanessa nodded, wearing a slightly awkward smile. "Right. Good luck!" Then she stepped into the car and closed the door, and before Candace knew it, she was gone.

For a moment, she did nothing- she merely stood in the lot and stared after the dreamlike vehicle. She blinked numbly, stunned that her friend was so well off. "Wow," she said blankly, fingering the keys to her mom's old station wagon in her pocket. "To think this is the girl who used to complain about not having a car at all…"

With a sigh, she brushed the thought away and took out the keys, approaching the car with an excited step. As she drove out of the lot, her heartbeat and determination grew with the speed of the car. What was the plan, she wondered? A thousand thoughts and worries were swirling in her mind, and she didn't have time for most of them. But it didn't really matter- although she didn't know the whole plan, she did know that her brothers were counting on her, and she could never let them down.

Now she just had to go get those pictures…

_To be continued…_

* * *

><p>:D That was fun, huh? Epicness is about to go down!<br>Phinny has wallabies on the brain! XD I have no idea why. He just does.


	18. Inators for Later

**Author's note: **I don't think there's all that much to say about this one, except for the fact that it's kind of short. Sorry about that. But trust me, from here on out, things are going to be epic! :D  
>Oh, and also- a muffin is just a naked cupcake. XD You'll get it when you read the chapter!<p>

Enjoy!

* * *

><p>Ever since the news announcement about Phineas and Ferb being captured, Jeremy had been feeling ill at ease. It wasn't only because of his wife's deep distress about the issue, or his own shock about their predicament; he just had a feeling in the back of his mind that tension was building, steadily leading up to a final climax that would change everything. The feeling had started that day Stacy came to visit, and it had continued to linger ever since, growing stronger with every passing day. It was as if someone was shaking a giant bottle of soda, and it was about to blow any minute. Jeremy would know- that happened sometimes during his shift at Slushy Burger. And it sure left a heck of a mess for some poor soul to clean up.<p>

Despite his uneasiness, Jeremy hadn't been focusing his thoughts entirely on Phineas and Ferb- he'd also been thinking about the job offer from LOVE MUFFIN. Candace seemed thrilled about it, but he didn't quite agree. Even so, he had to admit that the pay was pretty good- better than the pay at Slushy Burger, anyway- and his band had been looking for an opportunity to play somewhere. They practiced secretly in the basement as often as they could, since LOVE MUFFIN had conveniently forgotten to place cameras there. Of course, they had to do it very quietly so no one would hear. It would be nice to get out and perform somewhere for real.

All the same, one had to consider that they would be playing whatever LOVE MUFFIN told them to, probably with subliminal messages. They might even change the band name- 'Jeremy and the Incidentals' could very well become 'We Love Muffins', or maybe 'Jeremy and the Naked Cupcakes', or something equally unimaginative and weird. And because they worked for LOVE MUFFIN, they would probably be horribly unpopular, so it wouldn't even feel good.

So clearly, the job offer wasn't so great. But the only problem with that was breaking the news to Candace, who might not take it well. She seemed so excited at the prospect of starting a better life with a better job, despite the fact that that job was not particularly favorable, that Jeremy felt it a shame to let her down. And, he mused halfheartedly, maybe it wouldn't be so bad…after all, LOVE MUFFIN would surely find another band to do the same job, even if he declined. One had to make a living, after all…

But just then, in the midst of his thoughts, there came the familiar sound of keys in the front door's lock, and the door opened. Jeremy, who was sitting at the kitchen table with a half-opened and mostly ignored newspaper in front of him, perked up at the sound and stood to greet his wife.

"Candace, you're back!" he said happily as she came in, wearing a welcoming smile. "How was the visit? Did you see Phineas and Ferb?"

"I did!" Candace exclaimed, throwing her arms around him in embrace. "They wouldn't let me in at first, but then I met up with an old friend, and she got permission!"

"That's great!" said he, returning the hug. "So how were they?"

Candace pulled away, shaking her head with a skyward gaze and a smile. "Oh, those two. Even when they're stuck in jail, they just have to find a bright side for everything! Phineas hardly changed, I think. And I can't tell whether Ferb changed or not."

"What do you mean?" asked Jeremy.

Candace gained a confused expression, then answered, "Well…I don't know whether he had super hearing before, but he definitely does now."

Jeremy laughed happily, leading her over to the sofa to sit down. "That sounds like Ferb, all right. So, what was the visit like?"

Candace grinned, taking in a deep, preparatory breath. Despite his being used to this by now, Jeremy couldn't help but give a small sigh and prepare himself for the torrent of chatting that he knew was about to pour out of her mouth. _Here it comes…_

* * *

><p>A good fifteen minutes later, Candace had nearly finished explaining everything in great detail and elaboration, from the beginning of her trip ("Traffic was slower than Grandma's homemade molasses, but at least it didn't taste as bad,") to her meeting with Vanessa ("She wasn't wearing her Goth clothes, I wonder if they got switched at the dry cleaners' again?") to the end of the talk with Phineas and Ferb, and even then she wasn't entirely done.<p>

"So then we went out to the parking lot, and I was like, 'Now what?' and she was all, 'I have a plan, you go get pictures so we can do stuff with them,' so we're going to meet back there after I get the pictures," she explained rapidly, barely pausing for breath. "Then she drove off in her car- oh, Jeremy, you wouldn't believe that car, it is seriously shiny!- and I came back here and told you about all this, and here we are now!" Here she stopped, wearing a large, excited grin and breathing heavily, and Jeremy sensed a good time to speak up.

"That's great, Candace, but why didn't she tell you the plan?" he asked inquisitively, wondering just what this plan entailed.

Candace shrugged, not particularly clear on this herself. "I don't know, something about jinxing it. If the audience knows about the plan, it doesn't work."

"Ohh," he answered knowingly, giving a small nod. "Well, I guess that makes sense. In that case, I guess we should stop talking about it."

"Probably, yeah," Candace answered, getting up as she spoke. "Now, I've got to find those pictures."

With that, she strode over to the computer desk and sat down, pressing the power button and waiting patiently as it fired up. Jeremy got up and stood behind her, still wondering about something.

"Candace, there's no way you guys can do this all by yourselves," he told her calmly, contemplating the difficulty of the task she was about to undertake. "You're going to need help."

Candace sighed, absentmindedly playing with the mouse. "I know. And I was actually going to ask for your help, too, but…"

She trailed off, and Jeremy gained a concerned expression. "Is this about that job offer?"

Candace nodded and turned to him, saying, "I know I have to help my brothers somehow, but it's just hard- if we do this, we'll probably be considered criminals and be hunted and stuff, and we'll never be able to come home!" Then, with a slightly embarrassed expression, she added, "And you won't be able to take that job. I know you were looking forward to it, but…" Here she sighed heavily. "Sacrifices must be made, I guess."

And she sighed, hanging her head low with an apologetic frown. Clearly, this was a very important issue to her- but Jeremy, on the other hand, just smiled and laughed gently.

"Oh, Candace, that's not it at all," he assured her, putting a hand on her shoulder comfortingly. "I never wanted to take the job in the first place, but you seemed so happy about it that I couldn't just outright say no. Don't feel bad."

Candace stared up at him with wide eyes, rather stunned. "You mean, it's okay with you if we don't get to have a better life?"

"No, no- I mean, I'd give up any job, no matter how fancy, to help you and your brothers," Jeremy answered with a smile, taking her hand. "And if you're ready to give it all up, then so am I- just as long as we're together."

Candace's eyes were sparkling once more as a touched smile spread across her lips, and she sniffed quietly. "Oh, Jeremy…"

And he pulled her into a loving hug, each happy just to have the other there with them. After a moment, Jeremy said softly, "You know, earlier today, I swear I saw Perry on the news." Then, with a playful smile, he added, "Your brothers wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would they?"

Candace laughed, although it was a little shaky with emotion. "Oh, you're not gonna _believe_ this one…"

* * *

><p>Elsewhere, Vanessa was driving steadily back to her father's house, and had nearly arrived at her destination. As she went, she couldn't help but wonder if he was home yet, or whether LOVE MUFFIN had decided to keep him for some kind of incredibly long meeting. Either way, she could talk to him later if she had to. It wasn't him that she needed- it was a few of his Inators.<p>

As she drove up to the imposing purple tower, she noticed that despite the explosion that had taken place there several days ago, it had been rebuilt already and seemed perfectly normal. That always seemed to happen whenever Perry blew it up. She often wondered if her father had some kind of 'Reconstruct-Inator' to fix it up for him, but if he did have such a thing, why hadn't Perry destroyed that, too?

As she contemplated this, she reached the bottom of the building and parked the car, shaking herself out of her thoughts so she could focus on the task at hand. If she remembered correctly, her father had once built exactly the kind of device she needed- and if he was there, then she could kill two birds with one stone and get his side of the story as well. But what if he wasn't home yet? Then what?

But as she stepped out of the vehicle, the first thing she saw was Norm- still rather beat up and smoking quietly, but repaired enough to be playing the radio cheerfully. Apparently, he had been retrieved from his parking spot in front of the Flynn-Fletcher House and returned to Doofenshmirtz, who didn't seem to have fully repaired him yet.

"Hi again, sis!" he chirped, extending one arm from the body of the vehicle to wave at her. "Did you want to talk to Dad?"

Vanessa raised her eyebrows, examining the many dents and holes that were scattered all over the robot car, along with the shattered back window. Oh, yes. Her father was definitely home.

"Dad? Are you in there?"

The shout was accompanied by a ring of the doorbell, which sang out the tune of the D.E.I. jingle happily. It echoed around the quiet apartment, receiving no answer, and before long it rang again. "Dad! Hey, open up!"

Doofenshmirtz, who was sitting on the couch with his head in his hands, didn't want to answer at first. He had thought that silence would help him think, but it hadn't- instead, it had only distracted him more. If possible, it had only made it harder to get his thoughts in order. The doorbell didn't help, either, and he wasn't in the best mood to answer it. But at last, Vanessa called one more time, saying that it was important, and he decided he had better get up and let her in.

Setting down the spare parts he'd been playing with, he left the sofa and trudged to the door, peering at the electronic peephole first just to make sure of who was calling. Vanessa's face appeared on the screen, seeming irritated and concerned, and he gulped. Oh, she was going to get him for this one. She had probably seen the news and wondered what was going on- and who better to ask than her dad, who was probably behind it all anyway. He only hoped she would believe him.

At last, he grasped the doorknob and turned it decisively, the door swinging open to greet his visitor. There stood Vanessa, one hand on her hip and one eyebrow raised.

"Hey, Dad. What took you so long?" she asked suspiciously. "You're not up to anything, are you?"

Doofenshmirtz sighed. "No, honey. I'm not up to anything." Then he stepped aside and offered a weak smile. "You wanna come in? I, uh…I haven't cleaned or anything, but you're welcome to visit anytime…"

A few minutes later, they were both sitting at opposite sides of the coffee table, Vanessa with her arms crossed and Doofenshmirtz with his fingers interlaced nervously.

After a moment, Doofenshmirtz chose to speak first. "I guess you probably saw the news, huh," he mused, giving her a doleful glance. Vanessa nodded curtly.

"I did," she answered with a frown. "You're not on the run anymore, I see."

"Nope," Doofenshmirtz replied, avoiding her gaze.

"And I guess you don't have to worry about Perry now, huh?"

Doofenshmirtz scowled and turned away. "Please, Vanessa, I really don't want to talk about Perry the Platypus…"

"Dad, you may not want to, but I really need to know what's been going on," Vanessa argued, refusing to back down so easily. "I mean, I already know _what_ happened, but what I really want to know is- _why?_"

Doofenshmirtz did not answer at first. His face was dark, and his expression was a cross between guilt, uneasiness, and a twinge of sadness. Before long, he looked up and said, "Look, the honest answer is, I don't know. LOVE MUFFIN did it, okay?"

Vanessa quirked an eyebrow. "What's that supposed to mean? You're part of LOVE MUFFIN, didn't they tell you? And why didn't you tell me about this?"

"I don't know!" Doofenshmirtz replied in a stressed manner, holding his hands out in front of him as if in self-defense. "They decided to do this without my consent! At the time, I was too busy talking with Perry the Platypus to realize that they were planning this, and even if they had told me about it before all of this happened, what was I supposed to do?" He scowled defensively and added, "It's kind of a tough choice to pick between your worst enemy and Tri-State Area domination, you know…"

Vanessa blinked. "It is?"

"It is _now,_" Doofenshmirtz answered darkly, scowling at the table. "He had to go and make everything all complicated. Did you know he has family, Vanessa? And now they're captured, too, and he blames me!"

Vanessa just nodded, as he clenched a fist half-heartedly. "Yeah, way ahead of you on that one, Dad. So, you really didn't have any say in this?"

"I didn't even know it was happening!" Doofenshmirtz exclaimed, obviously distressed by this. "I mean, I guess they did try to give me the heads up…but, hey, it's not _my _fault if I decided to watch LOL Llama videos in the middle of one of those boring meetings!" he huffed, crossing his arms stubbornly.

Vanessa's eyes widened in bewilderment, and she nodded slowly. "Riiight…it's totally not your fault." Then she cleared her throat and asked, "So, you went to see Perry?"

Doofenshmirtz nodded sulkily. "Yeah. He's, um…he's kind of mad at me."

"Kind of?" Vanessa asked, noticing the peculiar way he said it.

Doofenshmirtz fixed his eyes on the table and fell silent for a moment. Vanessa stared long and hard at him, waiting for an answer. Finally, he conceded, "Okay, so he's furious at me. He thinks the whole thing is my fault, and he got all worked up about it, too- and he keeps mentioning this one day from eight years ago that I can't remember!"

The answer came out in an upset burst, and when he finished, he slipped into hostile silence once more. Vanessa raised an eyebrow once more.

"I'm guessing they let him have the translator back when you visited, huh?" she asked dryly. Doofenshmirtz only nodded.

"I kind of wish they hadn't," he muttered. Then he added quietly in an embarrassed voice, "He called me a moron, a bad liar, and a wannabe all in one sentence…"

Vanessa resisted a tiny giggle and cleared her throat. "Wow, harsh."

Doofenshmirtz nodded resentfully. "Definitely harsh. He's really, really mad. I mean, seriously mad. He probably _hates _me by now…"

"But I thought he already hated you," said Vanessa in confusion.

Doofenshmirtz just sighed. "It's very complicated, sweetie."

There followed a short silence, during which Vanessa considered her father's words. Well, he was probably telling the truth, that much was obvious- he usually didn't lie about things like this. If he had really been part of the operation, then he would be gloating about it, not trying to deny his involvement. Another thing that she noticed was that he seemed to feel rather regretful about the whole thing, which gave her an idea. Maybe, just maybe, he didn't want Perry and his friends to be captured. Maybe something in his heart was against the whole thing, begging him to do something about it. She could always use a fourth person in on the plan- so if she phrased it carefully enough, it might be worth a shot.

"Hey, Dad?" she started slowly. "Can I ask you something?"

He only made a small, "Mm," to show that he had heard her, but she took it as a sign to continue. "What would happen…if Perry escaped?"

Doofenshmirtz shrugged indifferently. "Doesn't matter. He's right…things just aren't going to go back to normal or whatever. Even if LOVE MUFFIN gets overthrown or something, Perry the Platypus will never come near me again. We'll probably never fight again, either. And hey, for that matter, I'll probably get thrown in jail instead of him. Good guys do stuff like that." Here he paused and looked back up at his daughter, rather troubled. "You know, I don't think he even wants to get out. And I should know, 'cause I suggested it to him."

Vanessa's eyes widened at this. "You did?"

He shrugged again, reasoning, "Well, at the time I was still thinking we could go back to normal, but then he went all logic-y on me, so I gave that up. I don't even remember what I was thinking then, but…" he paused, then concluded with a frown, "basically, the whole visit was one big argument. Not fun."

He didn't elaborate, and Vanessa didn't ask him to. After a short pause, she decided to try again, still determined despite his hopeless attitude. "Dad, if I told you someone was trying to break the rebel leaders out- which nobody is, of course," she added hastily, responding to his questioning glance, "how would you respond? Would you help them, or tell LOVE MUFFIN?"

Doofenshmirtz thought for a moment. "Well…it's not really happening, right?"

Vanessa shook her head quickly. "No, no, of course not."

He gave it a bit more thought, then shrugged. "I wish I had an answer for you, sweetie, but I don't. Perry the Platypus decided to mess with my conscience, so I don't really know what I'd do anymore. Before, I would have turned them in right away and gotten some kind of reward- but after all the stuff I saw today?" He frowned regretfully, remembering the long line of captured rebels that he had seen after getting out of jail. "Honestly, I got nothing."

Vanessa sighed heavily. Why did he always have to be so difficult? "So, you wouldn't help?" she prompted, trying to get a definitive answer from him.

Doofenshmirtz shook his head.

"And therefore you'd tell on them?"

Doofenshmirtz shook his head again, denying both questions.

"I told you, I don't know," he repeated earnestly, looking rather tired by now. "Maybe I would just do nothing."

"Well, maybe you _can't _just sit around doing nothing," Vanessa persisted, still hoping he would decide to help. "Maybe the world- or at least, the Tri-State Area- needs people who won't just say 'whatever' and walk away!"

Doofenshmirtz merely replied, "Technically, I wouldn't be doing _anything_, so I wouldn't say 'whatever' or walk away. I'd just stay home. Does that count?"

When his statement was met only with a stern stare, he sighed. "Look, Vanessa, I have a lot of things on my mind. This might not be the best time for us to talk…"

Vanessa hesitated for a moment, examining his face. It conveyed only two things; one, he definitely looked tired. Come to think of it, it had been an awfully long day, and it was starting to get late. Maybe he really did just need to get some sleep, so he could sort out his thoughts later. The second thing was that he was clearly indecisive and very upset, so to ask for his help in overthrowing the very empire he himself had founded probably wasn't such a good plan at the moment.

At length, she conceded. It was probably better to abandon the chase here, because if she didn't, it probably wouldn't end well. At last, she said disappointedly, "Okay…but I need one more thing before I go. Do you mind if I borrow some old Inators from the storage room?"

"Nah, go ahead," said Doofenshmirtz passively. "I'll probably never use anything in there again, anyway."

Vanessa nodded, still feeling rather let down, and stood to leave. As she strode out of the room, a wisp of a sigh escaped Doofenshmirtz, but she didn't look back.

* * *

><p>The storage room was still a little black after the explosion that had taken place there, but aside from that it was fully intact. Over the years, Doofenshmirtz had tried to build plenty of new Inators, but with no nemesis to destroy them, they had simply accumulated in his storage room once he got bored with them. He had pretty much given up on causing havoc now that he already ruled the Tri-State Area, but there were still an awful lot of the machines piled up in the wide, dimly-lit room. Vanessa was only searching for two; one, an old android developer that she vaguely remembered from when Doofenshmirtz was considering making some clones of himself for friends; and two, an even older machine that, rather than be completely destroyed, had managed to survive. (Although it wrapped the entire building up into a nice little bow in the process, with Doofenshmirtz trapped inside. She still had no idea how he had gotten out of that.)<p>

As she strolled through the long lines of Inators, one finally caught her eye. It almost looked like the Time Transporter-Inator, but wider, and perhaps slightly bigger. As she examined it, she remembered distinctly the first time she had seen it. It was after LOVE MUFFIN conquered the Tri-State Area, and her father had been bored. So he had decided to build the Android-Inator and make robot clones of himself, so they could keep him company. Oddly, he never bothered to use it- why, Vanessa never did figure out.

Conveniently, the other Inator she had been looking for was right beside the first one. It was only about her height, maybe a bit taller, and there was a large red button in the back. Vanessa had never actually seen the Wrapped-Up-in-a-Nice-Little-Bow-Inator herself, but thankfully, Doofenshmirtz had thought to label them with sticky notes.

Smiling to herself, she quickly got behind the controls of the older machine, aiming it at the Android-Inator with a squeaking sound from the wheels on its base. Then she pressed the large red button, and it zapped the Inator with a flash of green light. When the light cleared, all that was left of the Android-Inator was a small white box, wrapped up in a red ribbon with a neatly tied bow.

Having packed up the Android-Inator, Vanessa then proceeded to move the Wrapped-Up-in-a-Nice-Little-Bow-Inator in front of a mirror, in order to fire it at itself. A moment later, she was carrying two neatly wrapped packages, both seeming perfectly harmless, innocent, and inconspicuous. Vanessa smirked. Phase one was complete- it was time to move on to phase two.

As she walked back out of the house, Doofenshmirtz looked up from the sofa and saw her. "Hey, I heard some kind of noise in there. Everything okay?"

Vanessa nodded. "Yeah, I'm fine. So, it's okay for me to take these for a while?"

"Sure," Doofenshmirtz answered plainly, his face rather blank and a little sad. "Just be careful, okay? Some of them are a little unstable. And don't accidentally press the self-destruct button."

"Okay, Dad," Vanessa replied. Doofenshmirtz nodded and turned to a nearby window, staring out at the gray city beyond. She watched him for a moment, wondering if there was anything more she could do; but at length, she decided that she had to go quickly in order to meet up with Candace.

"Try to get some sleep, Dad," she told him, a note of concern in her voice. Then, striding towards the door with her packages in hand, she called back a final word of thanks and left.

As the door swung shut behind her, Doofenshmirtz sighed. He had a strange feeling that something was going to happen- something bad. And accompanying it, there came the strange feeling that everything was leading up to one point, one final choice. Whatever that choice was, it made him nervous and uneasy. But for the moment, there was nothing he could do. The flame had gone out; the fight was over…

But for Vanessa and her friends, it was just beginning.

_To be continued…_

* * *

><p><em><em>OOOOH :O

Excitement is building! This is gonna be epic! :D

In fact, we're approaching the last few chapters now. From here on out, it's all action! I hope you guys will enjoy it!


	19. Operation Something Crazy

**Author's note: **Operation Something Crazy is a go! :D  
>I don't really have anything else to say, but I'm sorry for the short delay. Anyway, this one is a little longer than usual, so I'm happy. ^-^<p>

* * *

><p>A short while later, Vanessa had driven back to the jail parking lot with the gift-wrapped Inators, ready and eager to put her plan into action. However, as she drove, a sudden thought struck her; unloading the android machine in the middle of the parking lot probably wasn't such a great idea. After all, the operation was supposed to be executed in secret, and with its many security cameras and guards, the LOVE MUFFIN prison was anything but secretive. There had to be another place where they could carry out the plan- but where? Vanessa didn't know of any places where LOVE MUFFIN had not placed cameras; even her own house was bugged. Unless they decided to use it in her washroom (the organization had had the decency not to place cameras in there), she was drawing a definite blank.<p>

As she puzzled over this, she turned into the lot and spotted Candace's rusty-red station wagon parked nearby. Eager to discuss this with someone who didn't have so much on her mind, she found a space close to the car and parked smoothly, hoping she hadn't kept her friend waiting for too long.

Candace was waiting in the car, seeming quite excited and a little impatient. As she watched the glossy black Ferrari pull into a space next to hers, she drummed her fingers on the steering wheel and tapped her foot anxiously. She had been apart from her brothers for too long, and was quite desperate to put the plan into action. Beside her, Jeremy was calm as ever, although he was still just as determined to break the boys out as she was.

The doors opened, and they all stepped out of their cars. Vanessa nodded with a smile by greeting, and Candace waved cheerfully, holding up the two pictures she had taken from home. At the sight of them, her friend's eyes brightened.

"Perfect!" she commended, adding a thumbs up for emphasis. "And I see you brought a friend, too…"

Candace nodded smilingly as Jeremy walked around to her side of the car. "This is my husband, Jeremy. He's willing to help however he can."

After Jeremy and Vanessa had introduced themselves, Vanessa decided to get down to business. "Well, I managed to get what I needed, so we're all set. Now we just need somewhere secret to do this- somewhere without any cameras." At this, both she and Candace frowned, and she voiced the thought that was going through both of their heads. "Problem is, I have no idea where such a place would be…"

"Actually, I do," Jeremy spoke up helpfully, surprising the girls. "Remember, Candace? It's kind of _incidental…_"

At this, Candace gasped delightedly. "Oh! That's right! Oh, Jeremy, you're so clever!" And she threw her arms around him affectionately, earning a quick hug in return.

Vanessa raised an eyebrow, not understanding the hint. "So, you two know where we can set up?"

Candace pulled away and nodded, smiling happily. "Yeah, it's just perfect! Trust me, no one will catch us in there. You can follow us in our car."

Vanessa hesitated, then shrugged. "All right, lead the way."

Candace grinned. "Good! See you there." And with that, she opened the door and hopped back inside the car. Jeremy smiled and waved goodbye, then crossed to the other side and got in. Vanessa quickly emulated them, clambering into the car as fast as she could to keep up with the redhead, who sped out of the parking lot as fast as the increasingly strict speed limit allowed.

Soon they were streaking through Danville, turning corners and traversing various winding roads that led to the outskirts of the city. Vanessa couldn't help but feel slightly uncomfortable as they drove on, knowing that they weren't in a particularly good part of town- and it didn't help when they arrived at an old, weathered-looking brick structure with a parking lot around the back, surrounded by a partially rusted and gradually collapsing chain-link fence. The road was dotted with potholes, grass was growing between the cracks in the sidewalk, and the sign that read 'FOR LEASE' was steadily fading. Still, as Candace and Jeremy approached in their station wagon, Candace couldn't help but sigh and comment, "Home sweet home."

"But after tonight, maybe not for much longer," Jeremy added thoughtfully, considering the consequences of leading a prison break. Clearly, they weren't good.

Candace nodded grimly. "You could be right; but we can't think about that right now." Then, with a determined grin, she added, "After all, a house is really just a house when you think about it. It's not home until you really love it."

Jeremy laughed happily in agreement, smiling at his wife's good nature and newfound maturity. "That's the spirit! Ready?"

Candace nodded, parking the car in a nearby space. "Ready."

* * *

><p>A few minutes later found the three of them descending the dimly lit apartment stairs, headed down to the basement of the apartment. Vanessa didn't quite understand why they were at such an old building, but she trusted Candace enough not to argue with her. Candace, on the other hand, glowed with pride in her husband for thinking of the spot, and as soon as they were in the privacy of the stairwell, she did not hesitate to start chatting about it in a low voice.<p>

"I don't know why I didn't think of this in the first place," she commented, running her fingers over the photos she held thoughtfully. "Jeremy's band has practiced for _years _down here, and there's no one to get them in trouble! Well, except for Mrs. Marcy. She comes down to do her laundry now and then. But she's really sweet and she loves their music, so she would never tell…"

As she went on about this, eventually splitting off into a tangent, Vanessa raised an eyebrow and whispered, "Is she always like this?"

Jeremy shrugged, smiling at his wife. "I think it's cute."

A moment later, they had reached the basement, which, like the stairs, was dimly lit, as well as rather cold. It was a large, mostly empty space with dull gray walls and a dirty-looking floor, and the ceiling was slightly lower than one would expect. A few cardboard boxes were stacked against the walls, apparently belonging to the inhabitants of the apartment, and a washing machine and dryer stood in the corner (along with a cheery Mrs. Marcy, who greeted the three of them before hurrying away with her now-emptied laundry basket).

"Well, here we are!" said Candace, coming to a halt in the middle of the room. She whirled around to face Vanessa and said, "And don't worry, there's no cameras or anything. LOVE MUFFIN must have forgotten to put them in here. So, do you think it's good enough? And speaking of that, what are we going to do in here, anyway? Who are those presents for? It's not my birthday, you know-"

"Wait, wait, wait," Vanessa cut her off, feeling swamped with questions. Candace halted with her mouth halfway open, then closed it abruptly. Vanessa sighed, taking the opportunity to look around the room in the brief moment of silence. "Let's see…there's definitely enough space in here, and it looks like you're right about the cameras. The ceiling's a little low, but that's okay. I think it'll fit…so yeah, it's great."

Candace grinned happily. "Oh, goody! But, I still don't know what we're doing."

"You'll see," Vanessa replied, wearing a mysterious smile. She promptly strode to the center of the room and set down the two packages she had been carrying, each a good distance from the other and the walls. Then, stepping back quickly, she untied the red bow on the top of the first one; and out of the simple white box sprang the tall, cylindrical shape of the Android-Inator, making both Candace and Jeremy jump in alarm.

"Whoa!" Candace yelped, watching with wide eyes as the machine began to whirr once more, fully functional even though it had just been mashed into a tiny box. After a moment, silence fell once more, except for the quiet sounds of machinery. Candace turned to Vanessa with a bewildered expression, asking, "How did you do that? And what _is _this thing?"

Vanessa smiled, amused by the amazement shown clearly on their faces. "It's an old machine that my dad built. I used this other machine on it to turn it into a little package like that. It's like the ultimate storage method!" Having explained that, she then approached the machine and began to fiddle with the controls, soon reaching a screen that read, _PLEASE INSERT PICTURES._

"Okay, Candace, you're up," Vanessa called to the girl. "We're going to need those pictures now."

Candace nodded, eyeing the machine with an air of wonder. She walked over to stand beside Vanessa at the control panel and, upon seeing a small slot for her to put the photos in, inserted them into the machine and stood back. The machine began to whirr loudly, and Candace hoped it wasn't loud enough to attract any attention. Thankfully, the noise didn't last long, and a moment later it stopped altogether.

For a few seconds, the entire room held its breath, waiting for something to happen. Then, with a small burst of steam, the doors on the machine slid open and out marched two lines of brightly colored androids, each designed to look like either Phineas or Ferb. Candace gasped, recognizing the robots from a faraway summer afternoon, and Jeremy exclaimed, "Whoa, cool!"

Vanessa surveyed them in amazement, impressed that her father could build something that would actually work. Or, at least, work as planned.

The brobots marched around the room for a moment or two, before forming a large group and halting, waiting for further orders. Candace's mouth remained open for a moment, and at last she found her voice.

"The Phinedroids and Ferbots!" she exclaimed delightedly, barely remembering to keep her voice down. "No way! How did you…?"

Vanessa grinned, rather amazed as well. "When your brothers mentioned androids in the jail, I remembered this machine. My dad built it years ago to make android copies of himself, but he never used it for some reason. Oh, well, it's being put to a good use now." Then she paused and placed a hand on her chin thoughtfully, musing, "Although, I didn't expect them to be so young-looking. It must have had to do with the pictures, right?"

Candace shrugged. "Well, you never said to get pictures of them as teenagers. Not to mention, I don't _have _any pictures of them as teenagers. And they were so much cuter like this, anyway!"

Vanessa raised her eyebrows, examining the robots. "Hm…well, you do have a point there. And I think these will work, anyway."

"Speaking of that, what do you plan to do with them?" Jeremy spoke up wonderingly.

Vanessa smiled. "That's what I'm about to explain…but first, we need to divide these up into three groups."

Candace and Jeremy exchanged confused glances, but they soon began to divide the brobots up anyway. While they did this, Vanessa went to the other package and undid the bow, releasing the Wrapped-Up-in-a-Nice-Little-Bow-Inator.

"You know, I've been thinking," Candace said, as she shooed a few Phinedroids into a group, "we should have a really cool name for the plan! Like, Operation…um…" She paused, not entirely sure of what the operation would be called. "Well, Operation something crazy."

Vanessa snorted upon hearing this and commented, "Good name, Candace. I could go for that."

Candace rolled her eyes with a smile and was about to try to come up with something else, when Vanessa finished setting up. "Okay, now lead one group over here," she instructed. Once the group had marched in front of the Inator, she got behind the controls and aimed it at them carefully. In a moment, the entire group had been wrapped up in a nice little bow. Candace's eyes widened.

"Okay, I don't get it," she confessed. "Why are we gift-wrapping brobots? Are we going to go give LOVE MUFFIN a present or something?"

Vanessa smirked. "Something along those lines…now, listen close, you two. This is how we're gonna do it."

As she began to explain the plan, Candace's eyes widened, and she commented, "Wow, you really think fast, don't you?"

"But why three groups, if that's how we're doing it?" Jeremy asked curiously. "Don't we only need two?"

Vanessa smiled mysteriously. "Not if we plan to get Perry out, too."

Beside her, Candace's eyes lit up with excitement, and she added eagerly, "Ooh, this is gonna be the best rescue mission ever!"

* * *

><p>About an hour passed, and during that time, Vanessa, Candace, and Jeremy chose to lie in wait until the right time to spring their plan. But LOVE MUFFIN, on the contrary, was anything but quiet. In honor of the capture of Agent P and the rebel leaders, they had planned an extravagant celebratory dinner, and everyone planned to attend- even Doofenshmirtz. He had been hoping it would take his mind off things, but as he arrived and was greeted by Rodney, who continued to gloat over their smashing victory, he knew it wouldn't. So far, while everyone else had been bragging about their plan, the captured rebels, and the various ways in which they had assisted, Doofenshmirtz had been eating silently, now and then trying to engage someone in conversation about something else. Unfortunately, that wasn't going well. The more the others gloated, the more guilt crept into his mind, until he began to wish he hadn't come to the dinner at all.<p>

At last, almost everyone was finished eating, and Rodney cleared his throat. Attention shifted to him, and he stood up to make an announcement.

"Good evening, everyone!" he greeted them grandly, wearing a sinister but rather wrinkled smirk. "And I trust it has been a good one so far, yes?"

Everyone cheered in agreement, and Professor Periwinkle could be heard commenting, "Yesh indeedy, Radneyh!"

Rodney's smirk widened slightly as he raised his hand for silence. "Good, good! So glad to see you're all having such a lovely evening. Now, as you know, we are gathered here today because of a great triumph- the capture of the leaders of that dreadful Rebellion, and the last agent of the OWCA! This, friends, is a wonderful occasion- and we would not be here tonight if not for one _very_ evil member of our ranks!" Rodney cleared his throat. "And that person is…"

Doofenshmirtz shrunk back in his chair, praying Rodney wasn't about to call his name.

Then, a moment later, Rodney called happily, "Bob, our resident cupcake guy!"

Everyone clapped cheerily, and in a nearby door leading to the kitchens, a chef appeared, wearing a pink apron with the LOVE MUFFIN logo on it. "Oh, you guys shouldn't have," he commented in a flattered tone, as the tips of his ears turned red.

Rodney called for silence once more. "You make such wonderful cupcakes, Bob," he commended the chef. "Oh, and before I forget, we have one other person to thank."

Then, clearing his throat, he called, "Doofenshmirtz, would you mind coming up here to join me?"

Cheering filled the room once more as Doofenshmirtz flinched, then stood up resignedly and slouched over to the head of the table to stand beside Rodney, who offered him a rather falsely grateful smile. Doofenshmirtz waved awkwardly to the assembly, rather unwilling to be there at all.

"Heinz was a key part in the plan," Rodney said once the applause had died down. "He played his role so well, not even his nemesis suspected his true motives! It's really thanks to him that we captured them at all."

"You go, Doofy!" Professor Periwinkle cheered, prompting a small smile from Doofenshmirtz. Rodney cleared his throat.

"Anyway, in honor of his accomplishments, some of us decided to organize a little reward for Heinz- a kind of trophy to put up on his mantle," Rodney continued. At these words, a servant stepped over and handed a shining silver parcel to Rodney, who held it up for the guests to see before handing it to a rather dubious Doofenshmirtz.

"Go ahead and open it, Doofy," he encouraged, placing the package in his hands. "It's definitely something to be proud of!"

Doofenshmirtz, slightly confused, gave the box a suspicious glance. It was rather small and neatly gift-wrapped, tied with a sumptuous teal ribbon. At last, he tore off the wrapping paper and opened the box, finding a rather unexpected gift inside; one that made him gasp quietly in surprise.

It was a small chocolate-brown fedora, looking rather worn and slightly singed on the brim. Its ebony band gleamed in the light, and a few stray teal furs were brushed across the fabric. He knew this hat, without a doubt- and it was the last thing he had expected to find in the box. Somehow, just being in its presence gave him an unshakable sense of alertness, as if its owner would come crashing through a window or door at any moment. It almost made him want to throw the thing aside in loathing, but somehow drew his attention to it like a magnet at the same time.

Gently, reverently, he set the box down and lifted it out, staring at it with wide eyes. "Perry the Platypus' hat…?" he breathed softly, eyes riveted on the object.

Beside him, Rodney laughed softly. "No, no, Heinz. It's not his anymore- now it's yours."

A soft _ooh_ swept around the table, as the others admired the hat. Doofenshmirtz shifted his gaze to Rodney in disbelief, and the scientist smirked.

"You defeated him fair and square- well, not really fair, but you know what I mean," Rodney explained. "So you get the spoils! You can hang this thing up on your wall, or maybe just crush it if you feel like. For that matter, use it as a birdbath if you wish- I'm sure your nemesis wouldn't mind at all!" And he and the others all broke into laughter, imagining the rage that such an act would provoke from Perry. Doofenshmirtz didn't join them- somehow, the sight of the hat had rather made him sick.

"I hope you like it, Doofy," Rodney said, patting his comrade on the back. "After all, it belongs to you now. Enjoy!"

With that, he called for silence once more and dismissed Doofenshmirtz to his seat, which he returned to in a bit of a trance. Everyone else returned to eating and talking, and dessert was soon brought out (a large platter of cupcakes freshly baked by Bob). But while everyone else chatted amongst themselves, Doofenshmirtz could only stare at the hat, feeling transfixed. He didn't quite know what to think of the situation, but there was one thing he was sure of.

It wasn't his hat, and it never would be. And his so-called 'victory', no matter how much LOVE MUFFIN praised him for it, was exactly the same.

* * *

><p>Elsewhere, dark was beginning to fall on the city, draping shadows over its urban canyons. Cars streaked along the roads, filled with tired workers headed home after a long day. Among these cars was a red station wagon, at whose wheel sat Candace. Beside her, Jeremy was mentally going over the details of the plan, ready to do his part as best he could. Candace took a stressed breath, feeling rather nervous.<p>

"Okay, so you know what to do after I drop you off, right?" she asked, keeping her eyes on the road.

Jeremy nodded with a comforting smile. "Yup. I can handle this."

"And we have both groups, right?" she pressed anxiously.

"Yes, yes we do," Jeremy answered, glancing at the large, rectangular packages resting on his lap. They were surprisingly light for two groups of gift-wrapped brobots. "Don't worry, Candace, we're all set."

Candace nodded and sighed, stealing a quick glance at her husband. "I know, but I'm just so nervous…what if something goes wrong, and we don't save my brothers? What if Vanessa doesn't get Perry out? What if-?"

"Candace," Jeremy interrupted firmly, halting her mid-sentence. "It's natural to worry about these things- in fact, it's actually an indicator that the plan is probably going to work- but you can't let it get to you too much. Try to calm down."

Candace nodded again, taking a deep breath. "You're right…"

Jeremy smiled and put a hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry, I'm sure Vanessa will be fine. We just have to make sure to do the best we can on our tasks, and hope everything goes right."

At these words, Candace smiled gladly, feeling encouraged. "Thanks, Jer…you always know just what to say."

For a moment, they drove in silence, and it wasn't long before they reached their destination at the outskirts of town- the Danville Power Plant, the primary source of power in the entire city. It was tall, foreboding, and guarded by a large barbed-wire fence, with many smokestacks and block-like buildings within. The sight of it gave Candace a chill, and she began to pray that the permission slip Vanessa had given them would get them past the guards. Thankfully, once they reached them, it did, and they were allowed entrance.

Candace drove through the gate and towards the facility, then found a good parking lot and stopped. "Okay, Jeremy," she said determinedly, a note of nervousness in her voice once more. "Operation Something Crazy is a go! Good luck!"

Jeremy nodded, looking rather apprehensive himself but keeping it well under control. He offered a slightly uneasy smile. "I'll do my best. And good luck to you too, Candace."

Candace smiled back, feeling the same uneasiness. "Thanks…and be careful!"

"I will," Jeremy promised. He reached over to give her a quick hug, which she returned gladly, then picked up one of the boxes and exited the car, walking away towards the power plant with a determined step. Candace watched him go for a moment, the nervous feeling intensifying gradually, until she remembered what a hurry they were in. Now in a bit of a panic, she quickly stepped on the gas and headed back out of the facility, zooming down the road toward the jail on the east side. If she was to get there in time, she'd have to hurry; phase one was about to begin.

At the power plant, Jeremy walked around to the back, where, Vanessa had explained, there happened to be a blind spot in LOVE MUFFIN security. She knew this because of a recent meeting that had taken place at DEI when she was visiting, during which her father and a few other evil scientists were discussing how to fix it at the lowest cost possible. As far as she knew, they hadn't gotten around to it yet because of Perry's reappearance- but just in case, she had instructed Jeremy to be very careful and scan the area for cameras and guards.

Having arrived at the back of the building, Jeremy hastily did this, checking the structure for any hidden security cameras and the surrounding area for any suspicious onlookers; but his quick check proved that there were no cameras or guards in sight, and this signaled that it was safe to move on with phase one. He then set the package he carried down on the grass below, untied the ribbon, and stood back as the box unpacked itself. Soon, a group of three brobots stood before him, fully operational and ready for orders. Jeremy grinned. The first part of the plan was working.

But the grin faded slightly as he turned to face the power plant, wondering just how he could accomplish his goal. Deciding that four heads were better than one (even if three of them were mechanical), he turned back to the brobots and said, "Ok, you guys, pop quiz; how do you shut down an entire power plant, cutting off power throughout the city, without getting noticed too quickly?"

The robots seemed to be thinking for a moment, as a few of them scratched their chins or heads thoughtfully. At last, one of the Ferbots raised its hand.

"Got an idea?" Jeremy asked. The Ferbot nodded, then walked over to the side of the building. It knelt down and indicated a small, covered power outlet, which was currently not in use, and took off the plastic cover.

Rather bewildered, Jeremy raised an eyebrow. "Wait, what are you going to do with-?"

But before he could finish his sentence, the Ferbot extended two fingers and poked them into the outlet like the prongs of a plug, sending an electrical shock through its body and into the outlet. Quite suddenly, there was a loud crackling noise and the feel of electricity in the air, and the entire facility seemed to fizz with a blue light. Jeremy watched with wide eyes and an open mouth as the noise intensified and then abruptly died, leaving the building slightly black. Suddenly, all over the gradually-darkening city, street lights went out; windows went black; store signs flickered out. Within a minute, the entire city had gone completely dark, and no one knew what had happened- not even Jeremy.

Wearing an open gape of amazement, he stared at the Ferbot, who merely stood up as if nothing had happened and gave the thumbs up. Its peers began to clap mechanically, seeming quite impressed, and it took a bow.

Jeremy just raised his eyebrows and shook his head in amazement. "Well, whatever works, I guess…" Then he turned away from the brobots and looked out over the city, wearing a slightly worried frown. "Now it's up to the girls…"

* * *

><p>Elsewhere at the western jail, Vanessa was anxiously awaiting the prearranged blackout in her car, running her fingers over her package of brobots while she waited. Suddenly, the street lights went out around her, as did the lights in the jail, and she knew that it was time for phase two. Smirking to herself, she hopped out of the car and ran for the doors, halting just before she reached them to unwrap the parcel she carried. As she pulled apart the neatly-tied red bow, just visible in the semidarkness, the box sprang open and released six brobots, eyes glowing brightly.<p>

"All right, you guys, listen up," she ordered, watching as they all snapped to attention. "I need four of you to come with me and rescue Perry. You two split off once we're in and find the control room. Then, permanently shut down any weapons that might be aimed at Perry, just in case. All right, you have your orders; so let's go!"

In response, the brobots saluted, and Vanessa smiled. _Perfect. _Then she opened the doors and dashed inside, followed by all six of the bots. Inside, the guards seemed rather confused, and a little alarmed at suddenly being plunged into darkness. It didn't help when twelve glowing eyes suddenly appeared in the darkness and began moving towards the prisoners' cells. One guard tried to stop them, but a Ferbot quickly reached up and pinched his neck, rendering him unconscious. Other guards appeared, but were quickly dispatched in the same manner.

Vanessa grinned, glad that the mission was going well so far. Just then, two Phinedroids suddenly split off from the group, disappearing down a dark hallway without a word. Vanessa noticed this and decided that they must have gone in search of the control room as they had been ordered, which pleased her. Now all she had to do was find Perry's cell and get him out, and it was imperative that she do so soon; he probably had no idea what was going on, and no idea that it was the perfect opportunity for him to escape. If she didn't reach him in time, and the power came back on, then the mission might be forfeit.

However, as these thoughts ran through her head and she ran down the hall, there was a sudden shout from behind her, causing her to jump in alarm. "Intruder! Stop!"

Maybe the plan wasn't going as well as she had thought…

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, Candace had only just arrived at the jail when suddenly, all around her, the lights began to black out. The radio stopped playing, having lost the signal, and suddenly the cars on the road were the only source of light she could see. Rather than be alarmed, she pumped a fist in the air.<p>

"Woo! Good job, Jeremy!" she cheered enthusiastically as she reached for a flashlight and her parcel. "I knew you could do it!"

Then, having finished her brief cheer, she jumped out of the car and dashed towards the doors, untying the ribbon on the package as she went. The brobots burst out of the package midway and landed behind her, and after a brief moment of confusion, they began to run after her.

"Okay, you guys know the plan!" Candace called, having reached the doors. "Let's go!"

The brobots saluted and dashed through the doors as she held them open, quickly followed by Candace herself.

Inside, like the other jail, chaos reigned. Several guards were running around and bumping into each other repeatedly, while one of them was unsuccessfully trying to get a phone to work so he could ask someone what had happened. Of course, no one could actually see this happening, but it didn't matter- Candace hardly gave them a glance as she dashed by anyway. One of the brobots stopped at the entry desk and nicked a ring of keys from the guard's belt, then sprinted off before the man had realized what happened.

Soon, Candace found herself running down a dark hallway, her flashlight casting haphazard beams of light all over the walls and ceiling. At last, she remembered a map that she had seen on her way in earlier that day, and stopped in the hall to get a good look at it. Seeing a route that would take her to the cells, she grinned.

"Good! Now all we need are the-" Just then, a brobot tapped her on the shoulder and held up the keys for her to see, seeming very proud of itself. Candace gasped delightedly. "The keys! Good work, you guys! Now, let's go rescue Phineas and Ferb!"

And with that, they were off again, tearing through the hallways and running past guards without a backward glance. Soon, they reached a door marked, _HOLDING CELLS_, and once it had been unlocked, found themselves in another long hallway with many doors. Candace glanced around, unsure of which door to try. Eventually, she shrugged and turned to the brobots.

"Okay, I have no idea where my brothers are in here," she told them. "But if we just keep checking all these doors, they have to be in one of them!"

The brobots saluted, and immediately, they all ran to a door and unlocked it. Candace peered inside hopefully, but all that her flashlight shone on in there was a sad-looking young man in a Rebellion uniform. He gasped when he saw the door opening, and his eyes widened even further when he saw the brobots.

"General Flynn?" he exclaimed softly, managing to make out the distinct shape of the brobot's head. Candace arched an eyebrow.

"General?" she asked in confusion. "Phineas is a _general?_"

The man suddenly noticed her, and with an excited smile, he said, "Yes, ma'am! Are you working with Phineas and Ferb?"

Candace nodded, still not entirely following the conversation. "Well, yeah. They're my brothers. I'm trying to break them out."

"Oh, that's great! Can I help?" the man asked, leaping to his feet. "I promise I won't get in the way, a-and I can fight if anyone tries to stop us! Please?"

Candace considered that for a moment, rather impressed. Then she shrugged and opened the door wide, giving him a smile. "Sure! We could use all the help we can get!"

With an eager grin, the man exited the room, thanking Candace profusely all the way.

After that, they went around to all the doors and began unlocking them, mostly finding Rebellion soldiers. Everyone they found was eager to help- even ordinary citizens who had been imprisoned for such 'crimes' as not being able to pay their taxes. Soon, Candace was followed by a large crowd of soldiers and citizens, all determined to help her break everyone out. Still, as proud and excited as this made her, Candace only hoped that she would find her brothers at every new door they tried.

At last, they had reached one of the final doors in the hall, and Candace was running out of hope. She slipped the keys into the door one more time and stepped away, ready to go unlock another door. "Okay, come on out, whoever's in there…"

But she did not expect to suddenly be tackled in a hug a moment later, nearly knocked to the ground by the sheer force of it. "Candace! Candace, you came to save us!"

She gasped as she recognized the higher-than-normal voice and sprout-like red hair, and then exclaimed, "Phineas! Ferb! Oh, I missed you so much!"

The troops around them cheered, and Candace released the boys from her embrace. There they were, both of them looking quite thrilled and touched that she had come to their rescue. They were taller than she had thought they would be, that was for sure- but still the same little boys who used to drive her crazy, and tears began to form in her eyes as she looked at their bright, beaming faces.

"What about Perry?" Phineas asked worriedly. "Is he okay? They're not going to hurt him, are they?"

"No, no, don't worry," Candace assured him, shaking her head. "We've got that covered."

"We?" Phineas asked, glancing around. He gasped as he saw the huge assembly of troops and the six brobots, who seemed to be very excited as well and were already unlocking more doors. "Whoa! Candace, you freed everybody!" he exclaimed in awe, staring down the long, narrow hallway at the many troops gathered there. "This is awesome!"

"Quite incredible," Ferb agreed, wearing a trace of a smile.

Candace grinned. "I know! Now, come on, you guys, there's no time to waste!"

Phineas nodded, then turned to the troops. "Okay, you guys! Some of you can stay here to rescue everyone else, and the rest of you come with us! We're breaking out!"

A loud cheer greeted him- more of a roar, really- and he grinned. "All right, Candace, let's get out of here!"

Candace nodded with a determined smile, and with that, they all ran back down the hallway and out of the room. Through the entrance door they went, and down several hallways, with the troops all running after them in the dark. As they turned a corner, Candace's flashlight beam fell on a few guards, who flinched in the light before noticing the escaped prisoners.

"Hey, you! Stop!" one shouted, running towards the boys. Candace gasped in fear, but Phineas and Ferb exchanged a quick glance and then nodded. Dashing forward, Phineas swept the man's feet lithely, then delivered a quick finger strike to the neck, knocking him out cold. As he did this, Ferb leapt over both of them with a flying side kick and blew the other guard backwards, knocking the wind out of him. Candace gasped as they both straightened up, looking rather satisfied with themselves.

"We've been practicing that for ages!" Phineas told his sister happily. "I mean, it's not like you can lead a rebellion for five years and _not _learn how to fight." Then he grinned and said, "What do you think Perry will say when we meet back up with him?"

Candace thought for a moment, then smiled. "I'm sure he'll be proud," she answered tenderly. "Just like me."

"Aww," Phineas said, blushing a little. "You're so sweet, sis!" Then he paused and said, "Wait, something else just occurred to me. This is a great plan and all, but…"

"But what?" said Candace, slightly worried.

Phineas was quiet for a moment before responding, "Well, frankly, I just don't see where the wallabies figure in."

Candace stared at him in bewilderment for a moment. Then, all at once, she burst into laughter and said, "Wallabies? Phineas, I knew you were wacky, but this is a whole new level!"

Phineas smiled in confusion, but he didn't seem to get it. "What?" he asked. "You mean there's no wallabies? …Are you sure we were thinking the same thing back there?"

* * *

><p>A short while later, they had run all the way out into the lobby, where the rest of the guards had only just realized what was going on. Phineas, Ferb, and the rebels made short work of them too (and even Candace managed to step on one of their feet), so by the time they made it to the parking lot, there was a heap of knocked-out guards left behind them. As they ran, the soldiers who had stayed behind caught up to them, followed by many more- and suddenly, Candace realized they had a problem.<p>

"Oh, Phineas, I just thought of something!" she gasped.

"What?" Phineas answered, taking note of the panic in her voice.

"How are we going to rescue all these people?" Candace shouted, rather out of breath by now. "All I have is Mom's station wagon, and it's way too small for all of them!"

At this, Phineas grinned unexpectedly. "Actually, Candace, Mom's car is bigger than you think!"

"What?" Candace exclaimed, not understanding.

Phineas just shouted, "Follow me!" and as he spoke, he dashed ahead to the car, followed by Candace and Ferb. Candace opened the door, still rather uneasy, and the three of them climbed in.

She pulled out her car keys and turned the vehicle on, asking worriedly, "But, Phineas, what was that supposed to mean? It's not like Mom's car is suddenly going to have a growth spurt or something!"

Phineas' grin widened. "You'll see! Watch this!"

And with that, he flipped open a hidden panel on the dashboard and pressed a button within. The car began to tremble, and a great rumbling noise echoed throughout it.

"Ph-Phineas, wh-wh-what's going o-on?" Candace demanded as the trembling intensified.

Phineas opened his mouth to answer, but upon hearing the first syllable, he noticed the shaky way his voice sounded and instead said, "O-o-ooh, Fe-e-e-eeerb, my voice sounds so-o-o-o funny like thi-i-i-i-is!"

Ferb gave the thumbs up, accompanied with a small, _di-i-i-ing_, and Phineas laughed shakily.

"B-but seriously, what's happening-?" Candace tried to ask, but before she had finished her sentence, there was a sudden jerk, and the station wagon shot up from the ground. The back of it elongated until it was the length of a bus, and new seats popped up from the floor, until the car had been turned into a full bus. Candace stared with an open gape, and Phineas grinned in excitement as the doors opened for the wide-eyed troops.

"All aboard!" Phineas called happily, and they were quick to obey.

Candace was silent for a moment, her mouth hanging open. At last, she said, "You…turned the car into a bus."

Phineas nodded cheerfully. "Yes, yes, we did. It's an upgrade we installed years ago, but never had a good chance to use!"

In response, Candace smiled and said by way of praise, "Ohh, if Mom were here, you two would be _so _busted." Phineas just laughed good-naturedly.

"That's the last of us!" someone called from the back. "Let's go!"

Candace nodded and closed the door. "All right, Operation Something Crazy is complete- wait." She paused there, frowning, and said, "You know what? I'm calling it Operation Wallabies instead."

This made Phineas burst into laughter, and even Ferb snickered a little behind his hand. Candace grinned as she floored the accelerator and took off out of the parking lot, tearing through the dark streets of downtown Danville. After several wide turns and a few near crashes, she reached the Danville Power Plant, where Jeremy and the brobots were waiting at the store across the street. His mouth fell open as he saw the huge, auburn red bus come driving up with Candace at the wheel, but it quickly turned into an expression of amazement.

"You guys, this is so cool!" he commented as he climbed in and found a seat at the front, the brobots following him to go sit by their peers.

"I know, right?" Candace agreed with a smile. "Phineas and Ferb did it!"

"That's awesome!" Jeremy grinned, high-fiving Ferb from across the aisle. "And it's awesome to see you guys again, too!"

"Likewise!" Phineas replied happily.

"All right, fasten your seat belts," said Candace from the driver's seat, and she took off again, this time headed for the outskirts of Danville. "Phineas, where can we find the Rebellion?"

Phineas thought for a moment over this, then replied, "Those who managed to evacuate probably made it to the secret tunnels. There's an entrance to them in the backyard; we can start there."

Candace nodded and turned down another street, saying, "All right, then. Hey, can someone call Vanessa and see how it went on her end?"

"I'll do it," Jeremy spoke up, taking out his cell phone. He promptly dialed her number and held the phone to his ear, waiting as it rang. It took a moment, but soon it was picked up.

"Hello?" came Vanessa's voice, sounding a little worried.

"Hey, Vanessa, it's Jeremy," Jeremy greeted her happily. "The plan went really well! We've got the boys here and a bunch of other Rebellion members, too, and we're headed somewhere safe. What about you and Perry? Are you okay?"

There came a sigh on the other end of the phone. "Technically…"

As she explained, Jeremy's eyes widened in disappointment, and Phineas and Ferb began to look somewhat alarmed. "What?" Phineas asked worriedly. "Is Perry okay? What happened?"

Jeremy sighed as well. "Hang on…I'll just put you on speaker."

A moment later, Vanessa's voice was echoing through the bus, explaining her current situation. It seemed that her end of the operation had not gone as well as planned- although she made sure to remind them that she and Perry were both okay, at least as far as she knew. When she went to rescue Perry, there had proven to be too many guards at the facility, and they had overpowered the brobots rather than the brobots overpowering them. Vanessa had escaped unnoticed and attempted to rescue Perry on her own, but she quickly discovered that the doors used an electronically powered keypad system which couldn't be operated with the power out. Then, a new surge of guards forced her to get out of the building as quickly as possible. Now, she said, she was back at her apartment, rather shaken and very ashamed.

Thankfully, as she explained, two of the bots had successfully found the control room, which contained the controls for a weapon that was aimed at Perry and poised to fire if someone from the east jail gave the signal. This was promptly disabled (in other words, demolished beyond repair), but the brobots were caught by the guards afterwards. On the bright side, Perry wasn't in any immediate danger- but LOVE MUFFIN still might decide to destroy him at any moment.

As the boys listened, their faces turned from triumph to horror, and Candace's delight faded instantly. The immense regret in Vanessa's voice was obvious, and it was clear that she felt terrible.

"You guys, I'm so sorry," she lamented sadly, and it was a very sincere apology. "I'm so, so sorry…"

Phineas sighed, but being the ever kind soul that he was, he merely responded, "Don't worry about it, Vanessa…we'll rescue Perry somehow, some other way." Then he perked up and suggested hopefully, "For that matter, why not right now? We've got a whole busload of eager troops and time to kill!"

The troops cheered loudly, eager to rescue the agent, but Candace called for silence. "Phineas, I want to rescue Perry just as bad as you do," she told him sternly, "but it's gonna have to wait. We're on a tight schedule, seeing as the power could come back on any minute. If it does, the cameras will start working again, and when we go to the backyard, they'll see us getting into the secret tunnels!"

Phineas was silent for a moment, amazed by her foresight, but he quickly protested. "But, Candace, it's important-!"

But Candace turned around to face him and shook her head, wearing a firm but sad frown. Phineas fell silent, realizing the truth in her words.

"We'll rescue Perry later," said Candace, "when we have an actual plan. Sound good?"

Phineas nodded despondently, rather quiet now. On the phone, Vanessa sighed.

"Again, sorry," she said regretfully. "But I should really go now. I might be able to work something out with Dad and keep Perry safe until you guys can save him."

Jeremy nodded. "That would be nice."

"See you, Vanessa," Candace called back from the front seat.

"Yeah, see you," Vanessa answered sadly, and she hung up.

Phineas leaned back in his chair disappointedly, and Ferb sighed. "…Well, Ferb," he said after a moment, "it sure has been a crazy day."

Ferb was silent at first. Then he replied, "And we never did see any wallabies, either."

* * *

><p>Elsewhere at the LOVE MUFFIN dinner, everything had been going smoothly until the power suddenly went out. The next few minutes were a time of absolute bewilderment, in which no one knew what was going on, until someone activated a backup generator in the building. Soon, someone ran up to Rodney and whispered something to him hastily, and the evil scientist's face went from irritated to shocked.<p>

He cleared his throat loudly and clapped his hands. "Everyone! May I have your attention, please!"

Gradually, this was accomplished, and all eyes turned to the bald-headed and rather upset-looking scientist. "I have a very unsatisfactory announcement to make," he said with a frown, brows furrowed angrily. "According to a report from one very woozy guard at the eastern jail, the rebel leaders have just escaped- along with nearly every other prisoner in the facility!"

A huge gasp of outrage echoed around the table, and everyone's eyes widened. Everyone began to talk rapidly again, before Rodney called for silence once more and announced, "In light of this, we must now carry out our vow."

At these words, everyone quieted down and wondered silently what he could mean by this. Rodney spoke again with a slight drawl to his voice. "You remember the clever little threat we came up with, where we destroy one prisoner if the other tries to escape?" They all nodded, and he continued. "Well, two prisoners have escaped; but Agent P is still in our clutches!" Then, with a sinister sneer, he concluded, "I don't know about you, but Aloyse Everheart Elizabeth Otto Wolfgang Hypatia Gunther Galen Gary Cooper von Roddenstein _always _keeps his promises. So, who agrees?"

Immediately, almost everyone broke into evil applause and cheering in favor of the decision, and Rodney's sneer widened considerably. However, Doofenshmirtz, who had stayed for the cupcakes (they were seriously good), only felt more alarmed at the prospect. How could they choose to destroy Perry the Platypus so soon?

_No! _he found himself thinking, although it was beyond him why he thought so. The only reason he could come up with was that Perry was _his _enemy and his alone, and therefore his was his job to destroy the agent. Now the only problem was voicing this opinion, when it would surely be the only one of its kind…

But then, a brilliant idea struck him. Clearing his throat, he stood up and waved to get Rodney's attention. "Rodney? Hey! I-I just wanna…can I say something?"

Rodney didn't notice him for a moment, but when he did, he waved a hand and silenced everyone again. "Yes, Doofenshmirtz?" he drawled. "Would you like to add something?"

Doofenshmirtz nodded nervously, and everyone's attention shifted to him. "Well…I, uh, I was just thinking…" he started awkwardly, feeling their stares all upon him, like very disapproving laser guns about to fire. He cleared his throat, trying to be more assertive, and continued, "Well, if we eliminate Perry the Platypus now, we'll lose our leverage. Then the Rebellion will just keep attacking us and we'll never defeat them- whereas if we keep him captured, they'll try to rescue him eventually, and that's when we'll crush them." He grinned awkwardly and concluded, "Sound good?"

At first, only silence met his words. Then, gradually, heads began to nod in agreement, and voices began to discuss the truth in these words. Even Rodney nodded and muttered grudgingly to a nearby friend, "Well, I guess that makes sense." Then he cleared his throat and said loudly, "Doofenshmirtz makes a good point…"

Doofenshmirtz cheered silently, sure that his nemesis was safe for the moment.

"…but I'd like to add something to it." Rodney smirked, looking very sinister. Doofenshmirtz looked back up, confused. _Uh, oh._

"Why not try to lure them back in and destroy them all at once…with a trap?" Rodney proposed, his smirk twisting into a malevolent grin. "I propose that we dispose of him publicly, thereby catching the rebels' attention and prompting them to launch a rescue mission. When they do, we will spring a trap, catching them so we can destroy them all in one shot!" Then he turned to Doofenshmirtz and asked gloatingly, "What say you, Doofy? How does that sound?"

Doofenshmirtz was silent for a moment, rather stunned, before responding, "Umm…bad?"

Rodney laughed briefly, joined by a few others, before responding, "Oh, it's worse than bad- it's downright devilish! All in favor?"

At this, everyone at the table cheered even louder than they had before, and the applause was nearly deafening. Doofenshmirtz's eyes widened, and he sat back down with a stunned frown. Well. At least they weren't going to kill Perry immediately…

"Ooh, and let's do it tomorrow," Rodney continued over the noise, "so they have hardly any time to prepare! How does that sound, my evil comrades?"

Doofenshmirtz just gaped at him, wondering if he should even try to look for a bright side. No; it would probably be fruitless. This, he knew, was the point that everything had been leading up to- unavoidable and inescapable, the consequence of everything he had done. It was a terrible feeling of helplessness, knowing that something would happen no matter what you did… But did it really have to be so? Or could he prevent it, if he chose to try?

As these thoughts swirled in his mind, he faintly caught Rodney's voice saying, "Well, I think we'd all better get home. We've got a big day tomorrow!"

Eyes suddenly narrowed in determination, Doofenshmirtz couldn't help but agree. They had a big day coming, indeed…

_To be continued…_

* * *

><p>:D Yaaaaay wallabies!<p>

...That's all I have to say. XD


	20. Earthquakes, Holograms, and Jelly Donuts

**Author's Note: **Sorry this one is a day late. I blame vacation. XD

Also, before I continue, I just figured I'd note: recently, I received a message from Mrs. Ferb Fletcher-inator, informing me that Time and Time Again has been nominated for the Best Phineas and Ferb fan fiction in her contest! :DDD I'm so excited! Cross your fingers!

Omigosh, I can't believe we're already on chapter 20! The climax is approaching at lightning speed...I think, anyway. I'm actually not too clear on where the climax is. *shrug* Oh well. Enjoy the chapter!

* * *

><p>It had been a crazy day for the Rebellion. All within a few short hours, they had celebrated the return of Agent P, then beheld his recapture, lost many more members to the LOVE MUFFIN prisons, and barely escaped to the secret tunnels that lay beneath Danville, known only to them. And even after this, though they hadn't learned it yet, the boys had escaped the very day they were captured and freed everyone else along with them.<p>

Perhaps saying it had been a crazy day was an understatement.

Major Monogram knew this well, as he had been among the first to react to the LOVE MUFFIN invasion of the camp. He and Carl had rounded up as many troops as they could get to listen to them and attempted a counterstrike, but with everyone panicking like they had, it was hard to get them to do anything. Eventually, he had given up on that particular endeavor and instead tried herding them into the secret tunnels, which met with a bit more success. At least he had managed to get some of them in, along with the boys' friends. Still, a far larger, even alarming, amount of them had been captured and probably put in prison somewhere. It wasn't going to look good on his resume.

And yet, despite all this, the Rebellion wasn't doing much at the moment. Without leaders, they weren't sure what to do anymore, and it wasn't helping Monogram's mood. As he and Carl sat quietly in the dimly lit, high-ceilinged hall that lay at the heart of the secret tunnels, the Major couldn't help but wonder if there was anything they could do at all to help the boys. He had already tried coming up with a plan to break them out, along with the boys' close friends- but Carl's advice had only confused him, and everyone else kept spouting ideas all at once. Eventually, Isabella announced that they should plan somewhere else, and she, Baljeet, and Buford had all left in search of a quieter spot. Now, however, the Major was suddenly presented with a different problem- aside from worrying about Agent P and the lost leaders, he didn't really have anything to do. For the moment, he occupied himself with staring around the room at the many troops congregated there, trying to calculate their numbers and wondering what they should do next. However, he wasn't coming up with anything yet, probably because he was too distracted (he blamed Carl for that). The chief thing on his mind was the way the troops had reacted to the invasion. Despite drilling for this sort of thing now and then, they had outright panicked when the LOVE MUFFIN men appeared. Apparently they hadn't drilled enough (he made a mental note to drill them harder). The Rebellion had spirit, and quite a lot at that- but unlike the LOVE MUFFIN soldiers, they lacked professional experience as an army, and that was what had brought so many of them down.

He sighed heavily, still maintaining a fairly calm visage. "It's the American Revolution all over again, Carl."

"It does seem like that, doesn't it, sir?" Carl agreed from beside him, resting his head in his hands gloomily.

"Except they didn't have any time-travel incidents," the Major mused thoughtfully, placing a hand on his chin (if you could call it a chin).

Carl thought about that for a moment, then pointed out helpfully, "Well, actually, a few historians have been debating the possibility of-"

"Don't you start another hypothetical debate, Carl. Remember the last time you did that?" the Major interrupted sternly, directing a harsh glare at his former intern.

Carl fell silent instantly, turning his gaze to the floor. "Sorry, sir," he replied, seeming rather embarrassed.

However, just as the Major was getting used to the silence, there was a loud pattering of feet and Isabella, Baljeet, and Buford all came running up to the bench that he and Carl were sitting on.

"Major Monogram!" Isabella called excitedly, waving as she wove her way through a few soldiers. "We came up with some possible rescue plans!"

"And I did a lot of math!" Baljeet added happily, tapping madly at a calculator he was carrying. Buford promptly hit him in the shoulder, and he yelped and fell silent.

Ignoring this, the Major turned his attention to Isabella with an intrigued air. "Rescue plans, you say?" he asked. "Well, let's see."

Isabella nodded, holding up a sheet of paper that she carried. "Yes, sir! Here's my idea…"

Monogram took the paper with interest, raising his unibrow as he read. As he scanned the page, Carl peeking over his shoulder curiously, Isabella narrated.

"My idea is that we could build a giant robot of some sort and use it to break Phineas out of jail," she said proudly, indicating a detailed drawing of said robot smashing the wall of the jail, with a stunned-looking Phineas inside. "My troop and I could totally build that! And, I've even made a list of all the parts we'll need."

However, despite her confidence, Monogram frowned. "Well, it's a good plan- but we don't exactly have a dual-cylinder, turbocharged, super-sized robot engine lying around."

Isabella's face darkened as she realized this, and she frowned. "Oh…I didn't think of that. But at least it's better than Buford's plan." She shot a disapproving glance at the former bully, who merely grinned and handed the Major a second paper.

"Not true," he argued. "My plan is much simpler than yours, and we only need one thing to do it with!"

Monogram raised half of his unibrow as he read Buford's plan. It was simple, all right- the paper only bore three steps.

_One- find something really smelly._

_Two- place said smelly thing in the jail, making everyone either pass out or run outside._

_Three- drag Phineas and Ferb out of the jail._

Each of the steps was accompanied by a small drawing, the last one depicting a passed out Phineas and Ferb being dragged out of the building by Buford. The bully grinned smugly, seeming quite proud of himself. "Good plan, huh? All we need is something really stinky, and a bunch of clothespins to wear on our noses."

"_I _don't have to wear any clothespins on my nose," Carl spoke up from behind Monogram. However, the Major shushed him instantly.

"Well, it's certainly…interesting…" he said dubiously, ignoring the obviously miffed intern behind him. "But I don't think we have even one clothespin down here, so unless we plan to send Carl in, that's not going to work. Besides, do you even have anything that smells bad enough to knock anyone out?"

Buford opened his mouth to reply, but Isabella interrupted with a disturbed frown. "Trust me, he does. You don't want to know."

Monogram exchanged an unnerved glance with Carl, who shook his head. "Okay, not asking."

Suddenly, Baljeet gasped loudly and exclaimed, "Ah-ha! It is just as I thought!"

"What, Baljeet?" Isabella asked curiously. "Did you come up with a plan?"

"Actually, no," Baljeet answered simply, grinning in delight. "I have just calculated the probability of a random event occurring without our knowledge, which could possibly spark a different rescue idea with a high probability of succeeding, thereby allowing our friends to compromise the security systems of the jail and free themselves! It's a very high probability," he added, wearing a satisfied smile. Everyone else just stared at him in bewilderment, having not understood a word he said.

At length, Isabella shrugged and said, "Maybe they'll just get out on their own."

"That is exactly what I just said!" Baljeet exclaimed in exasperation.

At this, Buford saw a perfect opportunity to pick on the Indian boy and immediately gave him a wedgie, which made Baljeet shriek in an extremely high-pitched voice. Monogram groaned, putting his head in his hands. This wasn't going anywhere…

Just then, several shouts of surprise and excitement rose from somewhere near one of the tunnel entrances. Upon hearing this sound, everyone looked up in alarm, and Isabella yelped, "What is that?"

"It sounds like someone coming in!" Monogram exclaimed, immediately suspecting LOVE MUFFIN. However, a moment later, he was proven wrong- the troops suddenly began to cheer loudly, exclaiming in joy over something that the rest of them couldn't see. The cheers gradually escalated to such a level that it was hard to hear anything else, and Monogram's eyes went wide.

"What's going on?" Carl questioned, looking to the Major for help. Monogram just shrugged, standing up to get a better vantage point. It was hard to see over the troops at all by now, as they had all clustered around something in a tight group.

"I don't know, Carl. I can't see a thing," the Major complained, trying to look over the soldiers' heads. "Can anyone see?"

Buford, who had by now moved on to dangling Baljeet by one foot, quickly swung the teenager up onto his shoulders. "The nerd can! Can't you, nerd?"

"I am not feeling so good," Baljeet moaned, holding his head with one hand and adjusting his underpants with the other. "But I think I can see something…"

"What is it, Jeet?" Isabella asked curiously, raising her voice to be heard over the cheering soldiers.

Baljeet squinted and peered out over the crowd, trying to see what they were so excited about. "It is…um…" Then, suddenly, his eyes went wide and he gasped, an amazed smile spreading across his face. "Ah! They are back! I told you my equation made sense!"

"What? You mean-"

"It is them! It is Phineas and Ferb!" Baljeet exclaimed jubilantly, making the other two gasp. And with that, all three of them took off through the crowd, cheering along with everyone else, and left a very stunned Major Monogram in the dust.

The Major blinked. "They're free already?" Then, getting up from the bench, he added, "Well, that was fast."

Sure enough, when Isabella and Buford finally broken through the crowd, with Baljeet still riding on Buford's shoulders, there were the boys. Apparently, they had just come in through the tunnel entrance from the backyard, and Candace and Jeremy were with them. Behind the four of them, a long line of Rebellion soldiers were still getting out of the entrance tube, looking a little frazzled after the trip. It was astonishing how many had been freed; but more astonishing yet was that the boys had indeed gotten out on their own, the very day they had been captured.

The moment Isabella broke through the crowd, she tackled Phineas in a hug, grinning happily. "Phineas! You're back!"

Phineas' cheeks turned pink and a goofy smile stretched across his face. "Isabella! I'm so glad you're okay!" And he hugged her back, earning a quiet giggle from Ferb.

Behind him, Candace whispered to Ferb, "Ooh, are they, like, going out now?" Which only made Ferb snicker a little louder.

"My friends! You are okay!" Baljeet exclaimed as he and Buford rushed to greet the boys, still sitting on Buford's shoulders. "How did you escape so fast?"

Phineas pulled away from Isabella, grinning happily, and answered, "Candace and Jeremy got us out! It was awesome!"

This received a stream of positive comments and greetings, to which Candace responded with an excited wave. "Hi, you guys!" she said happily. "It's been way too long- well, mostly. I could do without the nerd and the weirdo for a little longer."

Baljeet seemed slightly offended at this, but everyone was too busy exclaiming over the boys to notice. At last, Monogram and Carl found their way to the boys, both looking quite relieved.

"Good to see you again, boys," the Major greeted them with a salute, to which the boys responded crisply. "And welcome back to the Rebellion! We were going to rescue you ourselves, but you got out too quick."

Phineas laughed at this, smiling good-naturedly. "Ah, that's okay. It's the thought that counts, anyway," he assured them.

"So what happened to you two?" Carl inquired, also saluting the boys.

Phineas opened his mouth to start explaining, but Candace cut him off. "Don't let him get started," she warned them. "He'll go all into detail and everything, and we have more important things to talk about."

"Like what?" asked Buford, raising an eyebrow with a frown.

Phineas quickly took the opportunity to speak again, saying, "Well, put it this way- I wouldn't put those rescue plans away or anything. We still have some work to do."

"What do you mean?" Carl asked, cocking his head inquisitively.

Phineas' face darkened, and his smile slipped away. "Well…the plan was to rescue Perry, too, but that didn't work. He's still in prison, but at least he's okay for now."

"Oh, no!" Isabella commented sympathetically, patting her friend's shoulder. Ferb sighed softly behind his brother, looking rather sad.

Phineas sighed as well, but his expression quickly brightened once more. "But don't worry," he said optimistically. "We'll get Perry out one way or another! And we have lots of time to plan."

Just then, as if on cue, there came a sudden burst of ringing from Candace's pocket, indicating that someone was trying to contact her. Eyes widening in surprise, she delved into her pocket and pulled out the pink phone, taking a moment to check the caller ID. All other talk ceased at this, and she grinned awkwardly. "Um…hang on, I should take this…"

And she backed out of the crowd, lifting the phone to her ear as she did so. As she left, she could hear Phineas beginning to explain all that had happened to him and Ferb (in great detail, just as she had predicted), to the obvious interest of his audience.

Once she had gotten away from the crowds of soldiers that surrounded the boys, Candace pressed the answer button on her phone and held it to her ear. "Hello?"

"Hey, Candace. It's Vanessa."

"Oh, Vanessa!" Candace exclaimed cheerfully with a smile. "We just got back to the rest of the Rebellion. It's so big! And we got in through a slide in the tree! And everybody keeps saluting the boys left and right! It's kind of weird…"

"I'm sure it is, Candace, but I actually called to tell you guys something important," Vanessa told her friend in a very serious tone. "You should probably put me on speaker so Phineas and Ferb can hear, too."

"Oh," said Candace, rather surprised. "Well, okay…" and she began to make her way back into the crowd, configuring the speaker settings as she did. Just when she had thought things were going to calm down a bit…

"Hey, Phineas!" she called, squeezing through a few soldiers to get to her brothers. "Vanessa called, and she wants to talk to you and Ferb."

Phineas looked up in the middle of explaining how he and Ferb had taken out the guards, and immediately paused. "Oh, okay. What about?"

Candace shrugged. "I don't know, but she says it's important."

Phineas' eyes widened slightly in alarm, and he rushed over to his sister, followed closely by Ferb. "Is it about Perry?"

"Yes," came Vanessa's voice, now loud enough for everyone to hear. "I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you guys need to hear this."

At this, Isabella, Baljeet, and Buford all frowned and joined Phineas at the phone. Major Monogram and Carl set to work hushing the troops enough to hear Vanessa properly, and soon silence ruled. Once things were quiet enough, Phineas turned to the phone and said, "Okay, go ahead."

Vanessa sighed. "I just talked to my dad- you know, the one that works with LOVE MUFFIN- and he told me about their latest plan. It's a really nasty one- they're planning to destroy Perry publicly, so they can lure you guys back into the city and eliminate you all at once!"

At this, a wave of shock went around the room, and they all gasped loudly. "Oh, no," Candace said quietly, gaining a fearful expression. Jeremy put an arm around her, looking very worried. Phineas, on the other hand, looked downright terrified.

"Oh, this is not good," he said, panic rising in his voice. "When are they doing this? How long do we have?"

Vanessa gulped, loath to say the words. "They're doing it first thing tomorrow morning, so you won't have any time to plan. Like I said, it's a trap. They'll be pulling out all the dirty tricks they've got."

Phineas gasped once more, and his hands flew up to cover his mouth. At length, he spoke in a slightly shaky voice. "Ferb," he said, the alarm in his tone quite obvious now, "what are we gonna do? She's right- we have practically no time to plan! We have to think of _something- _otherwise, Perry will…he'll…" he shut his eyes and shivered, unable to bear the thought. "This is exactly what we tried to prevent! I can't believe this!"

On the other end of the phone, Vanessa sighed in a stressed way. "I'm so sorry, you guys. If I had been able to get him out in the first place, this never would have happened…"

"But we can still rescue Perry, right?" Isabella chimed in hopefully, putting a hand on Phineas' shoulder. "There's still time for us to break into the jail and get him out!"

"Actually, there isn't," Vanessa answered grimly. "They've already moved him to a temporary holding cell in my dad's building- which is also where they plan to destroy him. It's in the center of Danville, surrounded by security cameras and a ton of guards. They're not just ready for you to come rescue Perry- they're waiting."

"But that doesn't mean we can't still get in and rescue him!" Isabella protested, determined to bring back Phineas' confident smile. "We've outsmarted LOVE MUFFIN countless times before- haven't we, guys?"

This was met with a quick cheer of agreement from the Rebellion, who, by now, were anxious to go rescue Perry. Some were even bouncing up and down on their toes, eager to get going. Isabella grinned and turned back to Phineas, whose hope seemed partially restored. "See, Phin? It's not too late!"

"And besides, they cannot possibly have calculated every means of infiltration and prevented it," Baljeet pointed out helpfully, prompting a slight smile from the redhead. "We just have to find an entrance at which they have not placed guards!"

"And how do you know there is one, nerd?" Buford pointed out skeptically, raising an eyebrow.

"Actually," said Vanessa slowly, a spark of an idea forming in her mind, "I think I might know just the place…"

* * *

><p>The night passed in planning from that point on, while the troops prepared themselves for the day to come. Thankfully, Phineas and Ferb were used to coming up with grand schemes before breakfast, so the task was not so much of a challenge for them- although simple things like stress and lack of sleep did get in the way. Once, while Ferb was diagramming how the troops would be arranged, someone in the crowd yawned loudly, which set everyone else yawning, making a huge chain reaction. Clearly, it wasn't easy to plan when one was half-asleep.<p>

But at last, the planning was done, and Phineas announced that it was time for everyone to go to bed. "I wish we could run off and rescue Perry right away, but we can't do that if we're all about to fall asleep," he told them, sounding very regretful about this. "Still, we can't have anyone sleeping late, so be ready to get up early and move!"

And before long, everyone set to work unloading the sleeping bags that had been stored in the secret tunnels for just such an occasion. It didn't take long to finish unpacking, and soon, almost everyone was sleeping soundly.

However, Phineas and Ferb found it harder to rest than the others. Of course, they had a lot on their minds, so this was natural, but it still wasn't helping. At last, Phineas felt he had to talk to someone, or he'd never be able to sleep. "Psst. Ferb."

In the other sleeping bag, Ferb's eyes opened immediately and he blinked to show that he was listening. "I can't stand just sitting here, not doing anything," Phineas whispered anxiously, wearing an uncomfortable frown. "What if we oversleep? What if we don't get there in time? What if…" He trailed off, noticing Ferb's blank stare, and sighed. "You're right, bro. I'm over-thinking this," he admitted, heaving a quiet sigh. "So long as we follow the plan, it'll all be okay…"

Ferb smiled comfortingly and reached over to pat Phineas on the shoulder. Phineas grinned in appreciation, although he still looked very worried. "Thanks, Ferb," he said warmly. "You always know just what not to say."

_Ding._

* * *

><p>The next morning was deathly silent. No breeze blew through the urban canyons of the city; no birdsong echoed through the trees. Even the perpetual city traffic seemed quieter than usual, as if the whole world were holding its breath. It seemed that only one thing in the world was awake; and that was the Rebellion.<p>

Though the surface world was currently sleeping, Phineas, Ferb, and the troops had been up since sunrise, preparing for the battle they knew was coming. Armor was donned, equipment was handed out, and plans were recapped and finalized (and Carl made a lovely breakfast of pancakes for everyone, seeing as they couldn't fight on empty stomachs). At last, all the troops were assembled in the main hall, in front of the tunnel exit, and Phineas stood before them to make a quick speech.

"Good morning everyone," he greeted them, a megaphone in his hand, and Ferb at his side. "And good luck on the endeavor we are about to attempt. As you know, we're here today to embark on a mission of vital importance. Today, we'll give our all to rescue Agent P- an incomparable fighter, an invaluable friend, and an irreplaceable member of our family. I'd go into detail, but we're kind of in a hurry, and Candace doesn't seem to appreciate long-winded explanations."

Somewhere in the crowd, Candace offered a tired smile and tapped her wristwatch.

Phineas smiled back grudgingly and continued. "Now, I'm not gonna lie to you- it'll be hard. It'll be dangerous!" Then, after a short pause for dramatic effect, he cracked a grin and added, "But it's also gonna be fun! Am I right?"

This statement was met with an enthusiastic cheer permeated by applause, while some banged their ray guns against their armor. Phineas' grin widened, and he added confidently, "Besides, we've not nothing to lose except our lives- so let's go for it!"

For a moment, applause and cheering blocked out all other sounds. Then Isabella, who had been standing nearby, leaned over and whispered, "Um, Phineas? We're not actually going to lose our lives, are we?"

Phineas thought about that for a moment, then gulped. "Um…probably not."

* * *

><p>Elsewhere in downtown Danville, most of the LOVE MUFFIN minions were stationed around and inside Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated, where they knew the Rebellion would have to go in order to rescue Perry. With their dark shades and sharp black suits, they certainly looked formidable- but not all of them looked quite so formidable. In fact, two of them looked downright goofy.<p>

Joe and Dean were enjoying their new promotion, awarded to them for discovering the rebel camp, by eating doughnuts on the job and relaxing on a nearby bench. Since neither one had wanted to get up early, they had only been there for a mere five minutes, despite it being their new duty to watch over the other soldiers. So far, they hadn't really done anything except sit and talk- but that was all about to change.

"So Dean, when do you think they're gonna strike?" Joe asked conversationally.

"I dunno," said Dean, taking a bite of jelly doughnut and wiping some powdered sugar off his cheek.

"Yeah, well, you should know," said Joe with a scowl. "It's your job to watch for them on that camera app of yours."

"I know," Dean grumbled, chewing as he spoke. "But I can't find my phone…"

His companion rolled his eyes in exasperation at this. "Oh, for crying out loud, Dean. We just got this promotion, and you're that anxious to lose it already?" Dean frowned and opened his mouth to reply, but that only made Joe wince. "Oh, gross! Didn't your mother ever tell you to finish chewing before you talk?" he criticized, punching his associate in the shoulder. Dean promptly choked on his food and began to cough violently, rather alarming the rest of the soldiers. The other men stared with a slightly disturbed countenance as Joe began to thump him on the back, all the while complaining about how annoying he was.

"Joe- _cough- _cut it out!" Dean whined, doubled over on the bench. "I feel like the whole world's shaking!"

At these words, Joe stopped unexpectedly, wearing a slightly confused expression. "Wait," he said slowly, ceasing his pounding on Dean's back. For a moment, he sat perfectly still and alert- and then his eyes went wide. "It's not just you, Dean- for some reason, the world really is shaking!"

"Earthquaaake!" Dean moaned weakly, attempting to sit back up.

"No, I don't think that's it," Joe contradicted, putting a hand on Dean's back to prevent him from doing so. "It's…something else…"

They were both silent for a moment, during which the rumbling noise intensified gradually, accompanied by a good deal of shouting. Dean looked up at his companion in confusion, a little scared, and Joe narrowed his eyes. At last, Joe's eyes widened to a ridiculous extent, and he too choked on his doughnut.

"What is it, Joe?" Dean asked frantically, becoming somewhat fearful now. "What's goin' on?"

Joe was incapable of speech for a moment, but he scowled and began to wave wildly at the LOVE MUFFIN troops, pointing at something ahead of them. Dean looked up at the last minute and was met with a shocking sight- a huge group of soldiers breaking over the hill, led by two teenage boys in glinting silver armor.

The Rebellion was back, and they meant business.

(Music time! :D Go look up: 'LOZ WW Molgera remix', and click on the one by megalorganiste.)

"CHARGE!" Phineas yelled, hoisting his ray gun high. Ferb raised a conch horn to his lips and blew it loudly, and with that, the troops all barreled down the hill, each shouting a battle cry that blended together into one huge shout.

"Yeah, well- _cough, cough-_ you guys charge too!" Joe commanded in a hoarse voice, urging his own forces onward. After a brief moment of confusion, the order was repeated down their ranks, and the LOVE MUFFIN soldiers rushed forward to engage the rebels, all hoisting their stun guns high and screaming harshly. Soon, laser beams were flying recklessly and fighting had broken out everywhere. Joe whirled around to his companion, clearly not interested in joining the fray, and coughed a few more times before finally managing to speak."Dean, call headquarters," he commanded, his voice thick with jelly. "Tell them that the battle's starting, and we have the leaders in our sights!"

Dean nodded, hastily fumbling for his phone in his pockets. "R-right!" As he did so, Joe began searching for something with which to wash the doughnut down, and he spied Dean's coffee cup sitting on the bench. Seizing the cup in a desperate thirst, he took a huge gulp of the liquid and immediately began to cough even more, having burned his lips on the hot drink.

However, after a moment, a small smile crept onto his face. "Ooh, is this chai?"

Dean seemed about to answer, but at last, his groping fingers found his phone, and he brought it out to face height so he could begin punching in the number.

Beside him, Joe groaned. "Aw, Dean! All that fuss, and it was in your pocket the whole time!"

"Sorry!" Dean whined, lifting the phone to his ear.

It wasn't long before another guard picked up. "Oh, hey, Dean. Wassup?"

"Hi, Ralph," Dean greeted happily. Then his face darkened as he got down to business. "Joe says to tell you that the rebels are here and we're fighting them now. We've got the leaders in our sights, ready to capture."

"Ooh, nice work," Ralph responded appreciatively. "So, do they look like they're onto us? Or are they just totally clueless?"

Dean squinted into the fray and quickly spotted the boys, who were currently surrounded by several soldiers and were mostly just using their ray guns to blast people backwards. Oddly, Ferb was wearing a large grin, and Phineas appeared to be giggling now and then in a rather out-of-character way. Observing them for a moment, he shrugged. "I dunno. They look pretty clueless to me."

"Well, then go get 'em!" Ralph encouraged. "Good luck, buddy!"

"'Kay," said Dean with a gulp. "See ya." And he hung up.

Joe smiled with a rather cocky gleam in his eye. "So, do we act now?"

Dean nodded, beginning to grin himself. "Yup."

With that, Joe motioned to a group of soldiers that had just come out of the building, his manic grin widening. "Then let's go nab the little unsuspecting brats!"

However, unsuspecting might have been the wrong word- for as Joe and Dean began to prepare to strike, Ferb narrowed his eyes in suspicion and tapped Phineas on the shoulder. The redhead looked up in the middle of aiming his sonic pulse gun. "Oh! What is it, Ferb?" The question was followed by a small giggle, which caused Ferb to roll his eyes.

"Cut it out and look over there!" the green haired boy said in a low voice, pointing at the minions. "I don't know about you, but I think they look like they're up to something."

"Oh, that's not good. They are up to something, aren't they?" said the other boy worriedly, in a very un-Phineas-like way. "They couldn't be getting ready to try to capture us already, could they?"

"Oh, yes they could," Ferb pointed out, blasting someone backwards with his Sonic Pulse Gun as he spoke. "It's written all over their faces. Look, they've even got some more minions helping them out!"

Phineas nodded briefly, biting his lip. "Well, I guess we'll just have to hold them off as long as possible. Just let them try to catch us!" he shouted confidently. Then a rather silly grin stretched across his face, and in a quieter voice, he giggled and said, "Oooh, I sound so cool with this voice! This really is the best plan ever!"

Ferb groaned quietly, reverting to his usual blank expression. "Dude, you really stink at staying in character…"

Phineas just let out a shrill, "SQUEE!" as he aimed the ray gun into the crowd and began firing wildly, the goofy grin fixed firmly in place.

* * *

><p>As all this was going on, the LOVE MUFFIN minions had all congregated around the front of the building, where Phineas and Ferb seemed to be trying to infiltrate. But around the back, only a few guards had remained in place, watched over by several cameras. Even though the sounds of fighting could be heard clearly, the guards weren't doing much.<p>

"I tell ya, man, this is the most boring job we could have gotten," the first one complained bitterly, bouncing on the balls of his feet with an excited air. "I wanna be out there whoopin' some butt! I don't wanna be stuck back here guardin' the stupid 'ol back door…"

"Back doors are very important," the other one pointed out. "It's a pretty cliché way of sneaking into places, and we're supposed to make sure no one takes advantage of that."

"No one's gonna take advantage of it," his friend grumbled, looking quite irritated. Just then, he looked up and gasped, seeing a small group of rebel soldiers coming towards them with their Sonic Pulse Guns raised. "Ok, so maybe they are."

"Stop there!" the second guard commanded, aiming his stun gun at the group.

"In your dreams, nerd!" one of the soldiers yelled back. And without hesitation, another fight broke out. In the midst of the fray, one of the rebels' laser shots flew at a camera hanging above the door, shattering it instantly- and moments later, a few stunning shots blasted the two guards off their feet, knocking them out.

"Good work, you guys!" one of them commended the others, wearing a bright smile. "All right, then, let's get going." And without further ado, he quickly reached up to his ear and grasped a small device resting there, mirrored by the other four. All at once, the disguises came off- and there stood Phineas, Ferb, Isabella, Baljeet, and Buford, all of whom had sneaked away from the fight in disguise. A moment later, one of the guards' phones began to ring, and Phineas reached down and picked it up.

"Frank! We saw you fighting a couple rebels down there, and the camera must have been hit. What's the situation like?" said someone on the other end of the device.

Phineas cleared his throat and said, in as deep and gruff a voice as he could, "Uh, all's clear down here, sir. We fought those rebels off like nothing."

"Oh, good. Well, we'll get someone down there to fix the camera later. For now, keep doin' your job, and we'll see you once the big event's over. Over and out!" And with that, the phone turned off. Phineas grinned, obviously quite pleased with himself.

"This is such a great plan, Phineas!" Isabella commended the boy, smiling sweetly at him.

Phineas' cheeks turned pink upon hearing her words, and he nearly dropped the phone he was holding. "Th-thanks, Izzy…"

"Should we not get going?" Baljeet prompted, looking around nervously. "I fear we will be caught if we stay here for too long…"

Phineas shook his head to clear it, then nodded. "Right! Yeah, right…okay." He then knelt down beside one of the knocked-out guards and pressed a button on his disguise module, releasing a beam of electric blue light that scanned the man's form. It beeped once, and Phineas clipped it back onto his ear. Everyone else mirrored him, having loaded the guard's appearance into their devices- and instantly, holograms appeared around all of them, mimicking the guards' appearances perfectly.

"Ooh, weird," commented Isabella, raising her hand in front of her face to examine it.

"I never liked suits," Buford said in irritation, adjusting his clothes.

"Buford, it is just a hologram. It is not really there," Baljeet pointed out dryly.

"Don't like 'em anyway," Buford insisted, scowling at the hologram.

"Guys, c'mon! We haven't got much time," Phineas reminded everyone, already heading for the back door. "Once, Perry told Ferb and I that this back door is always unlocked, so let's see about that…"

He approached the back door and turned the handle, then glanced back at the others. Isabella nodded encouragingly, and Ferb crossed his fingers. Phineas grinned and turned the handle, opening the door smoothly. "Looks like Perry was right!" he exclaimed triumphantly. "Let's go in. And remember, stay in character."

"Yes, sir!" the other three responded, and the five of them all ran inside.

The inside of the building was dark compared to the bright, early morning sunlight outside, but it was sufficiently lit. Immediately before them was an elevator and a door leading to a stairwell, along with a few potted plants. Motioning to the others to follow him, Phineas headed for the elevator and pressed the call button, practically shaking in anticipation now.

"Hey, Phineas, speaking of staying in character," whispered Isabella, "how do you think your decoys are doing?"

Phineas shrugged, eyes locked on the elevator doors as if he could will them to open. "Good, I hope. Irving has spied on Ferb and I so much that he could probably imitate me in his sleep- although his voice acting skills still need a little improving- so I think he'll be okay. Besides, those disguises are accurate down to the last detail- they could fool anyone."

"Well, that is good," said Baljeet with a small smile.

"Who'd you get to be Ferb?" Buford asked.

"Some girl who must have come from the jail," answered Phineas. "She never did give us her name, but we think she must have gotten out when the rest of us escaped. She seems perfectly nice, though, and she did a good Ferb impression, so we let her do it."

"So you just let some random girl do this, without even asking who she was?" said Baljeet, sounding slightly exasperated. "What if she is not really on our side?"

Phineas shrugged again, starting to seem a little stressed out. "I don't know, she just seemed trustworthy somehow, and she said she was some kind of secret agent- oh, look, there's the elevator!"

As he spoke, the doors opened with a light _ding, _and the five of them piled inside. Phineas immediately began to scan the buttons, looking for one that would take him to the lair. Vanessa, being anxious to help however she could, had told them that that was where LOVE MUFFIN had taken Perry, and that was where Phineas and Ferb were going to rescue him.

"Vanessa said it was on the forty-fifth floor," he muttered anxiously. "So why isn't there a button for the forty-fifth floor?"

"Phineas, maybe we just heard her wrong. It could be on the forty-second," Isabella suggested, pressing the button for the aforementioned level.

Phineas nodded, although he didn't look entirely convinced. "Hopefully…"

With that, the doors closed, and the car began to move upwards steadily. The whole way, Phineas kept nervously playing with the Sonic Pulse Gun he carried, while Buford continued to mess with his holographic suit and Baljeet scolded him for it. This carried on for several minutes, until at last the elevator came to a halt, and Phineas ran outside. However, when he did so, his face fell.

"This isn't the lab!" he exclaimed disappointedly, instead seeing a long hallway that stretched before them, lined with doors. However, another elevator nearby caught his attention, and he rushed over to it. "Hey, wait. Maybe this'll take us there!"

Looking up at the floor marker above the doors, he noticed that it went to the forty-fifth and grinned. "Perfect! Let's just hop in here-" but a moment later, he noticed that the call button had a small slit near the bottom of it and a sign pasted overtop, reading, _MUST HAVE SPECIAL PERMISSION TO ACCESS THIS ELEVATOR._

Phineas snapped his fingers in frustration. "Darn! We can't get into this one without some kind of permission slip!"

"Well, why don't we just bust down the door?" said Buford cockily, raising his fist as if to punch the doors open.

Phineas shook his head quickly. "No, that won't work. See that camera over there?" he indicated a camera in the corner of the hall, poised to watch over the special elevator. "If we bust in, they'll see us and know something's up. I don't think we're going to be able to use force."

"Then what should we do instead?" asked Baljeet nervously, glancing up at the camera in a slightly fearful way. Phineas placed a hand on his chin and closed his eyes, obviously thinking very hard about this. Beside him, Ferb glanced at the other elevator and snapped his fingers. He then tapped his brother on the shoulder, catching his attention quickly.

"Got an idea, Ferb?" asked the redhead. Ferb nodded, then stepped into the elevator and indicated a button marked '_ROOF_'. Upon following him inside and seeing what he was pointing at, Phineas cocked his head.

"But Ferb, what if we blow our cover?" he asked worriedly, immediately understanding what Ferb was getting at. Ferb just blinked, and Phineas nodded. "Hmm, you're probably right. It won't matter by then, anyway…" Ferb then tapped his watch, indicating that they really had hardly any time left. Phineas bit his lip, then turned to everyone else.

"Okay, guys, we've got a plan," he called. "It's a little crazy and it might get our cover blown, but we don't have enough time for anything else. Everybody back in the elevator, and I'll tell you what we're gonna do."

* * *

><p>A few moments later, they were headed for the roof and Phineas had finished his explanation. Baljeet was the first to react, and he gulped in fear.<p>

"Phineas, this sounds rather dangerous," he said timidly. "Are you sure it is a good idea?"

"It's the only one we've got," Phineas said grimly. "So whether it's safe or not, we have to do it now, or they'll destroy Perry before we can get there!"

"Don't worry, Phineas. I'm sure your plan will work, and we'll save Perry in time!" Isabella assured him, putting a hand on his shoulder. This seemed to alleviate some of Phineas' stress, but he still looked very worried.

"I sure hope so…" he murmured quietly. Just then, the elevator came to a sudden stop, and everyone fell silent as the doors began to slide open.

_Ding._

_To be continued…_

* * *

><p>:D<p>

.  
>Oooh, who's that mysterious, non-plot-relevant girl? ;)<p> 


	21. The Party Crashers

**Author's note: **First and foremost, I would like to apologize profusely for the extreme lateness of this chapter. This is the longest I've ever made you guys wait, and I feel just awful about it. But I think it was worth it, so I hope you'll forgive me. :)  
>Also, regarding Doof, I have good news- he's done sitting around and despairing. ;) Not saying anything else for the moment, but this chapter and the next are gonna be pretty epic! w However, I'll warn you here, the entire climax is not contained in one chapter, so it cuts off at a really dramatic part. But don't worry! I feel it my duty to remind you all here that I update every other week, so the next part will premier in good time, and not at whatever random date I feel like posting it on. I would advise you to write it down somewhere- it's gonna be pretty epic! :D<br>Also, this one was goingto be the longest chapter ever written...but it actually turned out to be _too long, _so I had to split it in two. XD Oh, well, more chapters is always better.

Oh, and before you read, I advise that you check my dA page and see the Disintevaporator-Inizer sketches I've uploaded. It's a complicated machine to describe, and I think things will go a lot better if you know what it looks like. :3 The link to my page is on my profile.  
>And as a last teaser before we begin; once, we studied Norman Rockwell in my art history class. Did you know that he gave himself a secret cameo in nearly all of his paintings? ;)<br>My word, this author's note has been long. All right, I'm done. Enjoy! ^w^

* * *

><p>The sounds of battle echoed throughout Downtown Danville- the chaotic, clanging, headache-inducing sounds of orders being shouted and battle cries rising above the dust, of the sharp blasts of lasers and the huge <em>BOOM <em>of the Sonic Pulse Gun. It was impossible to ignore, no matter where you were in the city- although no one was really trying to ignore it anyway. Already, some citizens had taken up arms and rushed in to join the Rebellion on a passionate whim, excited to help. Others had hidden away in their houses to keep themselves and their families safe until the danger had passed, and still others were hanging out their office windows with open mouths. Somehow, the whole situation seemed very final, as if it were the last battle the Rebellion would be fighting- and since this kind of thing didn't happen too often in Danville (despite the other crazy things that did), no one wanted to miss it.

However, to say the battle could be heard anywhere was a bit of an overstatement- there was one place where its sharp sounds could not penetrate. That place was deep within Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated, high above the other buildings around it, nearby where Perry's temporary holding cell was located- and, in sharp contrast to the outside world, it was nearly silent.

Prior to the battle, Perry had spent a fitful night in his holding cell, reflecting bleakly on the events of the past day. Everything had happened so quickly, he hardly knew what to think anymore- and sometimes, he wished he didn't have to think at all. After all, nearly every thought that came to him was hopeless and full of hurt, and they just never seemed to end.

Locked in the cage that was his cell, the agent drew his knees up to his chest and put his arms around them, closing his eyes to the scene around him. He had been there so long, it seemed, that he could picture every detail of the room; the guards standing by the cage in the corner, the other guards standing by the doors, with their eyes staring into the cage with an unnerving watchfulness, and the overall emptiness of the place. There was nothing there, except for him, the guards, and the cage, and only one door served as the entrance and exit. The familiar purples and greens of Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated were painted on the walls, but they gave him no comfort- rather, they were the reason he shut his eyes so tightly. After everything that had happened to him, Perry didn't want to think about his nemesis at all. Even after he had been left in peace at the jail, his troubles had not ended- and though he didn't want to think about it, he couldn't help but relapse into those painful memories from the previous day…

* * *

><p>(Music time! And no, I'm not kidding with the crazy title. XD Go look up 'Portal 2 OST Volume 2- PotatOS Lament')<p>

The talk with Doofenshmirtz had not gone well at all.

Not that Perry had expected it would. In fact, when the guard told him that his nemesis had come to visit, Perry had initially considered an attempt to refuse, even though he was fairly sure it wouldn't work. It wasn't that he didn't want to see anyone, it was just that he dreaded the argument he was sure would arise from the visit. And what an argument it had been- looking back on it, he couldn't help but wince and hug his knees a little tighter. After hearing that his own nemesis hadn't remembered their Neme-Versary again, for the second time in the last five days (or eight years, possibly- Perry didn't even want to try to think that one through), he had begun to wonder if it was a day worth celebrating at all- and that was not a particularly comforting thought to have when he was trapped in a jail cell all alone, awaiting the doom that he knew would come eventually.

That night at the jail was no better. Having nothing else to do, Perry had simply curled himself up in a corner of his cell and attempted to fall asleep there, so he could be spared from his endless worries for a few hours. Unfortunately, even this was not very fruitful, for despite the long day he had had, it was the very exhaustion he felt so sharply that kept him awake. It didn't help when suddenly, the lights outside the cell flickered out and there was a huge commotion from the guards, who, unknown to Perry, were very alarmed at the sudden loss of power. Their confused shouting irked him even more than their usual raucous yelling, and he covered his ears in a vain attempt to escape the noise and find the silent relief he longed for.

Just a short, confusing half-hour later, all the lights were back on and Perry had hardly noticed a thing. All he knew was that for some reason, there had been an immense amount of shouting outside, and he didn't know why- but considering these were LOVE MUFFIN guards, he decided they were probably just arguing over something stupid. Perhaps one of them had spilled a drink on the other's newly dry-cleaned jacket, or someone had made a corny joke that caused a ruckus. These thoughts only distressed him further, and he wondered how anyone could argue over such petty things when so many terrible things were happening all around them. This, in turn, reminded him of his dear boys, alone somewhere in a cold jail cell; and finding this a thought too upsetting to ponder, Perry finally drifted into a short-lived sleep that was filled with dark remnants of dreams.

The next thing he knew, it was still incredibly late at night and one of the guards was rousing him, while another set about fetching the handcuffs from the previous day and a thick metal collar. He was then led out of the jail, with several thickset guards around him and the large and rather awkward collar locked around his neck and shoulders, and loaded into a van that took him all the way to Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated. He could hardly see the building through the early morning mist and his own tiredness, but the sight of it gave him shivers.

Seeing this, one of the guards in the front seat turned to his companion and asked, "You think he's awake enough now?"

The other guard turned around and examined the platypus, then shrugged. "Probably. Besides, we gotta show him sooner or later…" And he pressed a button on the dashboard, which lit up red. A TV screen promptly descended from the ceiling in the back of the van, met with a somewhat confused and uneasy glare from Perry- and when it flickered into focus, the wrinkled and sinister visage of Rodney appeared on the screen. Perry narrowed his eyes at the screen and growled under his breath, although he knew it was probably just a prerecorded message.

"Hello there, Agent P," drawled the evil scientist, smirking down at him. "You're probably wondering where we're taking you, and why you're being taken there. Well, I hate to _break_ it to you-" here he snickered to himself, as if he had just made a clever joke, and continued, "but there's been a little problem at the eastern jail- a _breakout_ of sorts- and I'm afraid the party will not be starting anytime soon."

He paused here with a self-satisfied smirk, while Perry just raised an eyebrow. Eventually, his expression changed to a frown and he demanded, "That's a joke, you know! Why aren't you people laughing?"

"Radneyh, wat ish tat even shupposed to mean?" asked a nearly incomprehensible voice from somewhere off screen, accompanied by a few other confused ones ("Did he just say you should pose to something?"). Rodney rolled his eyes in scorn.

"It's a Miley Cyrus reference!" he argued, looking quite exasperated. When his remark was met with further silence, he added, "What, you never listened to her?"

More silence, during which someone coughed awkwardly. Eventually, the voice from before replied in a disconcerted tone, "…You _did?_"

Rodney bristled, seemed to consider replying, and then sighed. "Look, the point is- earlier this night, a shocking event occurred at the eastern jail. It seems your precious family tried to break out of jail, with absolutely _no_ thought of the consequences whatsoever- not even that little threat we posed about hurting you if they did!" He donned an expression of mock astonishment and added, in a very false sounding voice, "Such a shame…I guess they must not love their _pet _quite so much as you thought they did. Maybe they're planning to replace you with a cat or something!"

At this, there came a good deal of snickering from off screen, and the evil scientist took the liberty of giggling along with his friends. "Yes, thank you for laughing that time…it was funny, wasn't it?"

On the contrary, Perry's face had gone completely white (not that you could tell, thanks to his fur) and his eyes were widened to their fullest extent, the dark orbs shining brightly. Phineas and Ferb had _what_…?

In the front seat, one guard snickered and said, "Is that the most deeply horrified secret agent platypus you've ever seen, or what?"

His friend just nodded solemnly. "Ee-yup."

However, Rodney wasn't finished yet. In fact, he was really just getting started. "Sadly, they'll never get that kitty," he continued, imparting a terrible sense of dread with the words. "It's rather a sad thing; you'll have to let me explain."

And then, he told _the_ _lie. _The one lie that he knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, would finally break the unbreakable.

"You see," he began, appearing the very picture of remorse, "some of our guards happened to be testing out my new Disintevaporator-Inizer in the parking lot at the time. It's a very powerful ray, you know, capable of destroying anything it comes into contact with- and I'm afraid the encounter didn't end well for your dear boys…"

At this, Perry's eyes widened even further than they had been before, and he took a sharp breath. It was as if someone had pierced his heart and stopped his world all at once, and in the sudden terror that had fallen upon him, he could think of just one word.

_No._

Rodney sighed with a mock sadness, shaking his head. "I'm so sorry…" he said, closing his eyes in a very solemn way. Eventually, someone giggled, and a malevolent grin spread across his face. "…that I couldn't have been there!"

With that, all the other scientists broke into evil laughter at the sheer cruelty of it all. Perry just stared, his entire body going numb. He couldn't move. He couldn't breathe. He could hardly even hear the cackling of the scientists as they praised Rodney's evil humor, mixed with the guards' badly-concealed guffawing to themselves. It couldn't be true…it just couldn't…

At last, Rodney and his cohorts finished laughing, and the scientist began to speak again. "Still, somewhere in my evil heart, I can't help but feel that it's just terrible to keep you apart from your family for so long. So don't worry- this morning, first thing after dawn, you'll be reunited with them forever. And I can assure you that I won't miss that!"

And with that, he gave a final evil chuckle, and the TV screen went black.

Perry was completely silent. Even the guards were quiet, waiting for some sort of reaction. However, no noise came from the back seat. At last, one turned around, wondering if the agent hadn't just dropped dead on the spot. Upon turning halfway, he saw that this was nearly the case.

Perry was standing motionlessly, staring with vacant eyes at the now blank television. His pupils had shrank as if in a harsh light, and his mouth had gone slack. His mind was buzzing with a thousand thoughts and worries, and yet was completely empty of all reason and sense, and that alone was enough to stagger him greatly. He knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Phineas and Ferb would never, ever betray him unless they had some sort of plan- but it was the latter part of Rodney's speech that had really struck him.

_An accident with the Disintevaporator-Inizer…_

Somewhere deep inside, Perry's heart told him they were okay- but all manner of dark possibilities began to crowd that hope out, each pushing harder than the first. Every 'what if' that came into his head was too much for him to take, and his small certainty was soon buried beneath all this misery. What if it was all a lie, and the poor things were still captured, unknowingly awaiting their own demise? Or, on the other hand, what if Rodney was telling the truth, and there really had been such an accident? The thought was like a terrible wound that he couldn't quite believe he had sustained- crushing, unbearable, inescapable, and horribly real…

At length, he took a gasp of air and directed his eyes back down at the floor, his expression beginning to change from numb disbelief to absolute horror. The world was suddenly blurred, and there was a pounding in his ears. His head spun, and he blinked hard to try to clear his flooded vision, to no avail. All at once, his strength gave out- and slowly, hopelessly, he dropped to his knees, hardly remembering to take a few harsh gasps of air as he sank to the ground. His thoughts began to drop away like snowflakes, leaving only a terrible desolation; his breathing grew ragged and uneven, and the tears fell unrestrained. Perry let them fall without care, for if what Rodney said was true, there was no reason to stop. Without Phineas and Ferb, his life was meaningless; without them, he was almost glad to just meet his doom and be done with it all. Their faces flashed through his mind, all the memories they shared, one after another with no relent, until they were flowing almost as fast as the tears that streamed down his face and into his wetly gleaming fur. He couldn't even brush the thickly flowing streams away, nor would he have attempted to do so if his hands had been free. What did he care anymore? If Phineas and Ferb were really gone, then he would rather face his demise and see them again than waste another moment on the face of this miserable earth.

_It's over… _he couldn't keep the words out of his head as they repeated themselves endlessly, and yet he kept denying it hopelessly. _It's over…it's all over…_

Through the perpetual sobs, he didn't notice as the van stopped with a slight shake. There came the sound of a car door opening, and before he knew it, the guards were getting out. But even as they led him up into the building, closer and closer to his own end, he did nothing more than follow limply, eyes shut tight and head hung low.

The unbreakable had been broken- Perry was defeated.

* * *

><p>Elsewhere at the bottom of DEI, amidst the furious fighting taking place there, the rebels had at last scored a point. The fake Phineas and Ferb had managed to reach the doors to the building, rushing inside and taking out the security cameras immediately, and they were standing just inside the lobby now, both breathing hard and looking quite exhilarated.<p>

"That went well!" said Phineas happily (or rather, Irving), panting heavily but grinning all the same. "So, what now?"

"Well, we could try to get to the top of the building to help the boys out," Ferb said in between breaths, grinning excitedly and glancing at the elevators. "That sounds like fun, doesn't it? Ooh, but we mustn't disrupt the plot! Plot first, eh, Irving-?"

Just then, he was interrupted by Phineas, who suddenly exclaimed, "Ooh, look! They have doughnuts!" And he promptly dashed over to a table on which a plate of doughnuts sat, looking very tempting. "Phineas loves chocolate doughnuts! I'll just take one so I can stay in character…"

Ferb's eyes went wide, and he sprinted after the boy. "No, wait, I wouldn't do that if I were you! This is probably going to hurt-!"

But just then, stunning beams flew from the shadows and hit both of them, stopping Ferb mid-sentence and making both of them yelp in pain ("I told you so!"). They both fell to the ground immediately, and out of the shadows stepped Joe and Dean, each looking very satisfied with himself and holding a long rope.

"I can't believe how easy that was!" Joe exclaimed in ecstasy, envisioning an even bigger promotion that he and Dean would surely be receiving sometime soon. "Dean, your trap was brilliant!"

"And symmetrical!" Dean added joyfully, kneeling down beside Phineas and brandishing the rope. He began to tie it around the struggling boy, who squeaked in fright. As he did so, the rope that he was holding suddenly brushed against the redhead's ear and caught on something there- something invisible. Dean raised an eyebrow and looked down at the rope in confusion, wondering what it had gotten snagged on.

"Hey, what gives?" he asked, reaching down to pull the rope away. Phineas gasped and flinched as he did so, and in a moment, it was clear why- when Dean pulled at the rope, it pulled off a small disguise module that had been resting on Phineas' ear, and the hologram that had been projected around the boy suddenly disappeared. Quite suddenly, Phineas was gone- and in his place sat Irving, wrapped tightly in ropes and looking very embarrassed.

"Aww," he whined in his normal voice, looking at the fallen device. "And I sounded so cool as Phineas."

At this shocking turn of events, both minions gasped, and Joe exclaimed hotly, "Wait, who are you? You're not the rebel leader we were after!"

"You're not even symmetrical!" Dean added, looking quite horrified and very disappointed at the evident lack of symmetry.

"It must have been a decoy," Joe mused with a furious scowl, staring into the middle distance. He was livid at having been tricked so easily, and it showed clearly in his bright-red, scrunched-up face. "So, if you're fake…then who's your friend?"

Irving squealed in terror, and Joe glanced suspiciously down at Ferb, who he had just finished tying up. Ferb just snickered unexpectedly, as if he knew exactly what was going to happen, which only seemed to further enrage Joe. Baring his teeth in fury, he reached down and ripped off the disguise module that sat on the boy's ear, and the hologram disappeared.

The reaction was instantaneous. Dean blinked and knitted his brows in confusion, his mouth hanging open stupidly. Joe's eyes went wide and his eyebrows shot up, as his jaw dropped in shock. All the color went out of his face and he suddenly became quite pale, as if he had just seen a ghost. For a moment, both of them just sat and stared, looking rather comical, while Irving looked from one to the other and giggled quietly. At last, Joe recovered his wits, groaning loudly and slapping a hand to his forehead. "Oh, not _you_ again!" he bawled, as if it was some old nightmare come back to haunt him. "Dean, lookit! It's that girl we arrested for being annoying!"

For there sat a teenage girl with lightly tanned skin and excited-looking brown eyes, wearing a shirt with Perry's face on it and a Perry hat to match, underneath of which her messy black hair stuck out. She seemed immensely amused by the whole situation, especially by the minions' annoyance.

"What are _you _doing here?" Dean demanded, still looking rather stupidly shocked.

"Makin' a cameo!" the girl answered cheerfully, wearing a rather out-of-place smile. "See, I wore my Perry hat for this and everything!"

Joe responded with a loud moan. "And she's still just as annoying as before! Worse, even!"

"She's _freakin'_ annoying!" Dean agreed vehemently, although he didn't seem too sure of what he was talking about.

"Watch your mouth, young man," the girl scolded lightly, disregarding the fact that she was clearly much younger than him. "If you keep that up, I may just delete you from the story entirely. Authors do that sometimes."

Dean looked somewhat terrified by this, but Joe ignored it. "Augh, we should have known it wasn't really them!" he lamented, clenching his fists tightly. "After all, they were acting totally out of character and weird the whole time."

"Speaking of that, how come you're allowed to act all out of character and break the fourth wall, anyway?" Irving asked, looking somewhat skeptical.

The girl just shrugged, saying, "Creative license."

"Dean, quick! We've got to warn headquarters about this!" Joe ordered, still attempting to ignore his odd prisoner.

"Ooh, sorry, that won't work," she chirped. "Dean accidentally dropped his phone somewhere while he was capturing us, didn't you, Dean?"

Dean gasped loudly, then plunged his hands into his pockets and began to search feverishly for the phone. After a moment, he came up empty handed, wearing a light blush of embarrassment. "Well, Joe, I hate to say she's right, but…she's right."

The girl burst into a fit of giggles at this, quickly joined by Irving (just for the heck of it), and Joe groaned loudly. "Dean, you moron! Now we'll just have to run up there and warn them ourselves, 'cause they took out the cameras too!"

With that, he leapt up and began to rush towards the elevator, abandoning the prisoners without a backward glance. Dean jumped up after him and began to follow, leaving a terrified Irving behind him.

"Oh, this is not good!" he whined, struggling weakly against the tightly-knotted ropes. "If they uncover the plan, we're toast!"

The girl just smiled. "Bah, don't sweat it. They don't even reach the elevator."

Irving opened his mouth to reply, looking bewildered and upset, but just then he was interrupted by a huge shattering noise from the front doors. Behind them, the glass doors had suddenly been broken down forcefully by a laser blast, sending splintered and cracked window glass everywhere. Irving squeaked loudly and the minions gasped, whirling around in horror- but before anyone could react any further, two stunning beams shot from the direction of the doors and hit both minions square in the chest, sending them flying right into the elevator doors they had been about to reach. A heartbeat later, they were both collapsed on the ground in heaps, Dean murmuring something about daisies in his stupor.

Thoroughly alarmed, Irving turned to the front door and gaped- for standing amongst the glass and holding Sonic Pulse Guns threateningly were none other than Candace and Jeremy, each wearing a rebel uniform and a triumphant grin.

"Now that's what I call busting!" Candace exclaimed happily. Then she paused, frowning, and remarked. "Whoa, déjà vu. Have I used that line before?"

"Yes," the girl confirmed, now giggling uncontrollably. "Yes, you have!"

"Weird! I don't remember when I would have said such a thing…"

"I can name the episode if you like!"

"Episode?" asked Jeremy, blinking in confusion. "Wait, are we talking about a TV show or something?"

"Well, technically-" the girl started, visibly on the verge of a long tangent. Thankfully, she was interrupted by Irving at the last moment.

"Look, what_ever! _Now, would somebody _please _untie me?" he whined, still struggling against his ropes. A moment later, the rescuers complied, and the ropes came off.

"Now what? We can't just leave Phineas and Ferb on their own up there!" Candace fretted, glancing at the ceiling.

"I agree, they'll need reinforcements," said Jeremy with a nod. "But how to get there? We can't all fit in the elevators!"

"Some of us could," suggested Irving meekly, glancing at the stairs in dread. He hadn't pointed them out on purpose, because it was the last route he wanted to take- but in a moment, Candace had come to the same conclusion, and she wasn't afraid to say it.

"Then we'll have to take the stairs!" she announced fiercely, pointing at the stairwell with conviction in her eyes. Jeremy nodded, Irving gulped in terror, and behind them, the girl giggled excitedly (which was taken as an agreement). Just then, the other rebels broke through the LOVE MUFFIN defense line and swarmed into the lobby, all yelling loudly and brandishing their laser guns. Immediately, more guards began pouring out of the stairwell- but Candace only grinned, undaunted.

"All right, you guys!" she called to her companions, tossing Irving's dropped disguise module to him as she spoke. "For my doofus brothers!"

"For Phineas and Ferb!" the others echoed gallantly, retrieving their Sonic Pulse Guns and raising them high.

"Let's do this thing!" Candace yelled by way of a battle cry- and with that, they rushed back into the fray, and the battle began anew.

* * *

><p>Just a short time earlier, at the top floor of Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated, most of the LOVE MUFFIN officials weren't paying attention to the events going on below- but excitement was buzzing in the air nonetheless. Orange-gold sunlight poured in through the windows, whose shades had been pulled aside, and it gave the place a sort of eerie, final look; an appropriate setting for an execution. The entire LOVE MUFFIN committee had gathered in the lab, which had been cleared of its usual clutter to better accommodate them, and while some of them were finishing setting up, most were talking eagerly of the ceremony they were about to watch. None of them seemed to mind that there was a huge battle going on at the bottom of the building, each convinced that their soldiers would take care of it easily.<p>

Along the back wall, several rows of raised chairs had been erected for the scientists to sit on, softly cushioned seats and all (although how they had gotten the things into the building, no one quite knew), and in front of these, positioned prominently at the center of the room, was a huge machine. The sunlight glanced off its highly-polished, steel-plated sides, illuminating the complex-looking control pad and glinting off of a huge laser sticking out from the back. It was comprised of a large cockpit from which to control the machine, with several steps leading up to it and a seat inside. Behind that, a huge mechanical arm stuck out, with several segments that appeared to be moveable. On the last segment of this arm were several disks, leading to a pointed end with four spikes surrounding it. It looked like the sort of thing one would see in a science fiction movie- huge and deadly, carrying a sense of power in the very air around it.

Of course, such an impressive machine was hard to ignore, and it had attracted a small crowd of onlookers since being brought to the building. Several scientists were crowded around the cockpit, admiring the huge laser, and four guards at the door were watching curiously from their positions. Naturally, Rodney just had to be in the thick of it all, gloating about his creation smugly while they all admired his work.

"Oh, this? It's nothing, really," he said in a falsely humble voice. "Just a little thing I threw together for the occasion, you know. The blueprints actually belonged to Doofenshmirtz originally, but he never used them, and since he's been busy these past few days, I thought I'd finish it for him! I'm sure he doesn't mind, do you, Heinz?"

Across the room, Doofenshmirtz glanced at the machine and frowned, seeming very worried and a little frantic. "Uh, sure. Whatever. I'm kind of busy right now."

Just then, the doors opened and Professor Periwinkle came in, holding a large cardboard box and looking very excited. Upon seeing him, Doofenshmirtz perked up and ran to meet him, completely ignoring Rodney and his friends. The bald headed scientist watched him go, then rolled his eyes. "Ugh, so hard to communicate with. No wonder they're friends!" And they all burst into laughter.

But Doofenshmirtz didn't care. He was too excited over the package that the professor had brought.

"There you are! What took you so long?" he asked, stopping in front of the professor as one of the four guards closed the door behind him.

Periwinkle groaned. "Oh, twaffic's just tarrible, Doofy! Tere's rebels wunning willy-nilly, and even the citysens are revolting now! But the worst paht tis, tey've taken awl teh good pahky spaces."

Doofenshmirtz just rolled his eyes. It was hard to understand what the professor was talking about, but from what he gathered, he could conclude that the man was a total nutcase. Then he glanced down at the package, and his face lit up. "You got it!" he exclaimed, grinning at the box. "How'd you do it? I thought you had to have special clearance or something!"

"Wellh, ah just towld tem ah wus gonna borrow tis ray gun tingy," said Professor Periwinkle cheerfully, "and tey sed it was fine! They looked a little cunfoosed, dough, and ah just koodn't figure out wah."

Doofenshmirtz stared blankly at him for a moment, trying to decipher the words in his head. At last, he gave up and turned to the package instead. "O-kay…so, now that it's here, what should we do?"

"Wayt until tey bring 'im in, ah guess," said Periwinkle with a shrug, handing the box to Doofenshmirtz. "Hear you go, Doofy. Gud lack!"

Doofenshmirtz nodded nervously, his hands trembling as he held the package tightly. "Thanks…I'm probably going to need it."

With that, the professor ran off to the stands, his role complete. However, the moment he was gone, Doofenshmirtz blinked in sudden confusion. "Wait. 'Good luck'- that is what he said, right?"

Of course, he received no answer, so he just sighed and followed the professor, knowing that his own role was about to begin.

"There he goes," one of the guards commented, watching Doofenshmirtz's retreating back. "He looks really on edge. What's up with that?"

"I don't know," another shrugged. "Maybe he's mad at the boss." And he nodded in Rodney's direction pointedly.

"Well, that makes sense. The dude is kind of a hater," the third added, narrowing his eyes at the bald-headed man.

"You know, I don't get that word. I always hear it on the web, and I just don't get it," the first added, scowling in thought. "What's haters, precious? What's haters, eh?"

The fourth spoke up unexpectedly, staring off into space as he did. "Hey, what do they plan to do with that platypus? Does anybody know?"

"Boil 'im, mash 'im, stick 'im in a stew," the second man giggled, grinning widely. And with those few words, they all broke out into hysterical laughter.

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, Perry had been removed from his holding cell and was now being taken to the top of the building, chained and handcuffed once more and utterly miserable. It was the second time he had been led to his doom this summer, he mused. But this time was definitely worse. Last time, the boys had been with him, and Candace, and even Doofenshmirtz. Sure, they had all been about to die- but they had been about to die together, working as a team to escape that fate. Now, Perry was alone, with no chance of escape at all…<p>

But he brushed that thought away as quickly as possible, unable to dwell on it for too long. He could not bring himself to think of Phineas and Ferb anymore; it was just too painful. As for Doofenshmirtz, he dreaded the thought of seeing him at the top floor, but there was no doubt that the evil scientist would be there. What would he be doing, Perry wondered? Awaiting his nemesis' arrival eagerly, excited to get rid of him at last? Or just standing there awkwardly, the way he had been when he came to visit at the jail? Either way, Perry didn't like the thought of it. He didn't like the fact that he was going to be destroyed in his nemesis' building, either- the very place where he had escaped death so many times before. Suddenly, he was flooded with memories of past battles and schemes, the few times when he and Doofenshmirtz had actually gotten along, and even memories that weren't related to the place at all, such as Phineas and Ferb and the times when he would sleep on Candace's bed uninvited. The sudden rush of emotion was too painful to withstand, and before he knew it, his eyes were obscured with tears again. He only wished it would all be over soon…

"All right, we're here. Someone tell the boss we're ready."

"Yes, sir."

A few moments passed, and Perry let his gaze drop to the floor. It really was over now, literally. When he passed through those doors, he was going to be destroyed, and there was nothing he could do about it. The final chapter. End of the line. Game over. However you wanted to phrase it, it all meant the same thing, and he was approaching that thing at lightning speed…

* * *

><p>Inside, everyone had found their seats, and Rodney was standing by the Disintevaporator-Inizer excitedly. "Oh, Heinz! Come here for a moment," he called, waving for the doctor to join him by the machine. Doofenshmirtz, who had been looking into the box from a secluded spot, hastily closed the lid and looked up furtively.<p>

"What for?" he asked, approaching his rival cautiously.

"Well, I was just thinking," Rodney started conversationally, speaking loudly enough so that the others could hear them clearly, "this is technically your machine, and it's your nemesis we're destroying today. It just seems right that you should get to do it, don't you agree?"

Doofenshmirtz blinked in surprise and fell silent for a moment, trying to think of a good way to refuse. "Umm…well, I don't know…"

"Oh, come on, Heinz. You know you want to!" said Rodney temptingly, ignoring Doofenshmirtz's uncertain expression. He turned to the stands to make an appeal, calling, "Don't you think he should get to do it, everybody?"

The scientists gave a loud cheer of encouragement (although some didn't quite seem to know what they were cheering about), and Rodney grinned. "See? We're all behind you on this one!"

Doofenshmirtz bit his lip. _If only that were true… _At last, he said, "Well, normally I wouldn't mind, but…"

"But what?" asked Rodney, seeming a little miffed that Doofenshmirtz hadn't accepted his offer right away. "I thought you _hated _your nemesis."

"I do!" Doofenshmirtz protested. "It's just…it's kind of hard to destroy someone after you learn they have family and everything. I'm not sure I can do it."

Rodney just laughed, as if Doofenshmirtz had made a joke. "Oh, don't be ridiculous, Heinz!" he sneered. Doofenshmirtz remained very disapproving, refusing to give up ground that easily. If he was to go through with his plan, he needed to be far from the machine, someplace where no one could see him, and that wasn't going to happen if Rodney managed to rope him into helping. At length, Rodney sighed.

"All right, then- let me tell you a little secret that you missed last night," he said slyly, leaning forward a little. "After you left, we came up with a brilliant idea to ensure our victory over your nemesis, and it's already been put into effect." At this, a twisted, sinister grin spread across his face, and he said, "So if you're worried that it's going to be hard, don't be- he's pretty much crushed. For you see, Agent P now believes…that his family is _dead_."

At these words, Doofenshmirtz's eyes went wide and he gasped softly, shocked by this sudden turn of events. For a moment, he was silent, and in this silence, a single thought came into his head.

_You dirty __**liar.**_

But before he could react to this thought, the doors began to open slowly and Rodney blinked in surprise. "Oh, here he comes now! Quickly, Heinz, you get in here and I'll stand on the steps. Don't worry, you'll do fine!" And without warning, he opened a small door on the side of the cockpit and pushed Doofenshmirtz up the steps and inside, closing it behind him. Doofenshmirtz whipped around to argue, but upon doing so, he tripped and fell into the chair behind the control pad with a loud, "OOMPH!"

The other scientists snickered briefly at this, but just then, the doors swung fully open, and they all fell silent. Into the room came two guards, each holding a thick, black metal chain. In front of them, his feet dragging and his eyes closed, was Perry. His hands were tied behind his back, and the heavy metal collar around him seemed to weigh him down as he walked (or staggered, really) toward the Disintevaporator-Inizer.

As he approached, someone in the crowd gasped, "Oh, he's just little!"

"Deadly, though," another scientist whispered in response. "Give him so much as a spoon and he could knock you out cold."

At last, the guards came to a halt, and the chains attached to Perry's collar clinked loudly, alerting him that they had stopped. Slowly, unwillingly, he opened his eyes and looked up, despair shining in the dark brown irises. Doofenshmirtz stared back for a moment, looking rather terrified, and then looked away- he could no longer bear the sight. Surrounded by his eager colleagues in the stands, Professor Periwinkle glanced at the abandoned box nervously, then at Doofenshmirtz, as if asking what he planned to do. Doofenshmirtz shot him a sideways glance of uncertainty, then shrugged slightly to say that he had no idea what to do. Periwinkle bit his lip, his glasses enlarging his concerned eyes to ridiculous proportions. "Uh, oh, Doofy…"

And so the silence continued to stretch, as Perry gazed absently at the huge machine before him and Doofenshmirtz wracked his brain for something to do. At length, Rodney said quietly, "Ah, Heinz, since you seem to be at a bit of a loss for words, I'll just say a few for you."

He cleared his throat, and attention shifted to him immediately. "Friends, colleagues, and our enemy," he began, sweeping an arm out grandly, "allow me to welcome you today on behalf of the League Of Villainous Evildoers Maniacally United For Frightening Investments in Naughtiness!"

Everyone cheered immediately, and the evil scientist grinned. Under any normal circumstances, Perry would have been scowling at them all and struggling madly- so it rather unnerved Doofenshmirtz when the agent simply directed his gaze to the ground again, closing his eyes in a pained way. What, nothing? Not even an eye roll at the ridiculous name?

"Everyone looks great today," Rodney commented, gazing around at the crowd. Then he turned back to Perry, saying, "Well, everyone except for our guest here. I must say, you look terrible!"

There was a small roll of laughter from the crowd, and Rodney continued with his speech. For Doofenshmirtz, however, that all faded into the background. As he observed his nemesis, he couldn't help but note that Rodney's words were certainly true- Perry really did look terrible. His fur was gleaming wetly again, which meant he had been crying, and there were slight shadows under his eyes. He even looked slightly thinner than usual, perhaps from stress, and the expression resting on his face was enough to make him look ten times worse. The one feature that stood out to Doofenshmirtz, however, was the fact that he wasn't wearing his hat. He just wasn't the same without it, and combined with his exposed features, it was difficult for Doofenshmirtz to recognize him at all. Was that really his nemesis? It was hard to believe- but then again, he didn't know any other platypuses who had that much control over their facial muscles.

Meanwhile, Rodney had finished addressing the scientists, and he seemed to be nearly finished with his brief speech. "Well, I think I've talked enough," he said, "and by now, we're quite ready to say goodbye, aren't we?"

More cheering from the crowd. Rodney grinned insincerely and at last turned back to Perry, who eyed him with a hollow stare. The grin widened and he proceeded to taunt him, saying, "What's the matter, agent? Isn't this the part where you escape?"

Perry looked away, his gaze landing briefly on Doofenshmirtz before it fell once more to the ground at his feet. Rodney's grin melted into a malicious smirk, and with a nasty tone, he commented, "I guess some routines aren't made to last."

With that, he nodded at Doofenshmirtz and said grandly, "He's all yours, Heinz. Remember, in one little flash of green light, this'll all be over- and then we can get back to our normal lives."

Doofenshmirtz didn't quite know how to respond to that, so he merely took a deep breath and turned back to Perry. His nemesis was still staring at the floor, and he seemed quite resigned to his fate. However, Doofenshmirtz knew that if he just had something to motivate him, along with some kind of distraction, he could change the tide…but what?

Out of options, he shut his eyes and squeezed his hands together in his lap, desperately trying to think of a way to execute his plan. However, nothing came, and he knew only that he couldn't do it alone. He needed some kind of distraction- anything that would give him the time he needed to do what he had to do. He needed _help; _and as soon as the thought entered his head, the last word began to echo desperately, the phrase ringing true every time. For a moment, it seemed that help would never come- but then, something happened that no one, under any circumstances, could have predicted. A ghost of a voice penetrated the room, barely reaching Doofenshmirtz and prompting him to look up slowly. A shadow, he saw, had fallen over the semi-transparent roof. Then more shadows joined it. And then, it happened.

_**BOOM!**_

Shrieks filled the room as the skylight shattered, allowing five figures to fall through and land, one after another, on the floor below. Rodney fell off the Inizer's steps promptly with a loud shriek, while Perry's guards jumped in shock and screamed in extremely high, girlish voices, only to fall on top of one another a moment later. Perry's eyes widened in shock, and he whirled around, the chain clinking wildly. For a moment, no one could see anything through a small cloud of dust and debris, but it wasn't long before it cleared. Upon seeing who it was, Rodney's face twisted in shock and hatred; Perry's eyes widened even more, and he gasped in a choked voice; and Doofenshmirtz, after recovering from his immense surprise, grinned. Well, he _had_ asked for a distraction; and this would definitely do.

For there, standing back to back with the boys in front, were Phineas, Ferb, Isabella, Buford, and Baljeet, all holding Sonic Pulse Guns and looking very determined. At the head of the group, Isabella on his right and Ferb on his left, Phineas smirked.

"Well, Ferb," he said, gazing around the room, "looks like we've arrived right in the middle of the party!"

Ferb smiled placidly, one eyebrow raised cockily. "And parties are all about rebellion."

_To be continued…_

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><p>XD Shameless self-insertion goin' on there…<br>Well, this has been an extremely confusing chapter, methinks. If anyone is wondering about anything, just ask (or go look up 'Boil 'em (Potatoes)' on Youtube XD). I can't answer everything, though.  
>Oh, and before I go...<p>

TATERS. OwO


	22. Forgiveness and Farewells

**Author's Notes: **You know, I'm beginning to notice a pattern here- I say I'm going to update on a certain day, and then I delay it several more days because I encounter an issue with the plot or get writer's block. Maybe I should just forget setting an update schedule…it's a longshot that anyone ever remembers anyway. XD  
>I have lots of lame excuses for the extreme lateness of this one, but the best are that it was my sister's birthday on the 24th and I had lots of stuff to do for that, and also, I had to finish some important science worksheets to show our home school evaluator. It's more important than it sounds…<br>But the best excuse is that I recently read an incredibly gripping Invader Zim fanfic called 'Experimental' by 360Kila on dA in around three hours with no breaks. XD It was freakin' awesome! And kind of creepy. I loved it. 3

And now, without further ado; chapter 21! :D Enjoy!

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><p>It was a stunning entrance, really, for something thought up at the last minute.<p>

One moment, everyone had been patiently awaiting their prisoner's demise, waiting for Doofenshmirtz to finish whatever it was he was doing while _not _eliminating his enemy. The next, there was a shadow; a shout; and then there was an indescribably huge, eardrum-shattering **BOOM, **and dust rained from the newly ruined ceiling, stinging their eyes and hurting their ears.

**(Music time already? WHAT IS THIS MADNESS? XD Here, go look up 'Boss Death' by Hatsune Miku- and let the epicness commence!)**

And then, there were the rebels.

They stood back to back, Sonic Pulse Guns raised and disguises discarded to give Perry hope. The scientists in the stands merely stared, openmouthed, utterly dumbfounded by the sheer fact that something had _broken through their ceiling._ Sitting on the steps, Rodney reflected all the shock, horror, and indignation that showed on his associates' faces, his own contorted into a furiously horrified scowl. Still wearing the ridiculous expression, he attempted to stand up and shouted loudly, "You fools! It's the rebel leaders! Don't just stand there- ATTACK!"

The calm was over. The storm had arrived.

With that, all the guards leapt up and charged, yelling loudly and brandishing their stun guns. Even a good deal of the evil scientists in the stands jumped up and grabbed laser guns of their own, running into the fray at Rodney's command. Phineas and Ferb did not hesitate to start blasting them with the Sonic Pulse Guns, and in moments, a huge battle had started.

Doofenshmirtz took that opportunity to leap out of the Disintevaporator-Inizer's cockpit, run right past Rodney and away from the machine, and make a beeline for the box he had received. However, before he could reach it, Professor Periwinkle descended the stands and opened it for him, then grinned and tossed him the machine-gun-like device inside. Doofenshmirtz caught it rather clumsily, fumbled with it for a moment, and finally grasped the double-handled grip with a thankful grin. Periwinkle responded with a double thumbs up and a bubbly smile, then sat back down excitedly to watch, as if it were some kind of sporting event.

Having retrieved the device, Doofenshmirtz turned around to face Perry and gasped, seeing that the agent had already been recaptured by one of the guards. He had been seized around the middle and was now being hauled away from the fighting by the man who had caught him, although Perry was struggling madly to escape his captor's grip and reach his boys- and it was here that Doofenshmirtz saw his chance. He began to dash in Perry's direction determinedly, once again passing a furious Rodney (who was now screaming orders hoarsely, flailing his arms and demanding to be heard over all the commotion). Doofenshmirtz paid him no mind as he ran past, but a moment later, he skidded to a halt as a uniform-wearing, curly-haired, red-faced figure went flying out of the fray and came spinning wildly across the floor, headed towards him. Baljeet slid right in front of him, crying, "OOMPH!" as he slid to a halt, and Doofenshmirtz yelped loudly and stopped short. In this momentary pause, an alarming thought crossed his mind- Perry was at the other end of the room, and he probably wouldn't be able to reach him in time now. And even if he did, what then? Being evil, he wasn't sure how to rescue anyone (that was more of a good guy thing), and he wasn't exactly capable of fighting off a big, burly guard, either. If only he had some sort of weapon…

"Oh! I think I have bruised my coccyx!" Baljeet moaned below him, setting down his SPG and rubbing his backside in pain. Doofenshmirtz considered just stepping over him- he was in a hurry, after all- but by chance, he glanced down at the abandoned device, and was struck with an idea.

"Hey, can I borrow this for a second?" he asked, and without waiting for the boy's consent, he stooped to grab the device and aimed it at his nemesis' captor. Baljeet just stared, his mouth half open, as he pulled the trigger and blasted the man away forcefully, causing Perry to fall and land face-forward on the ground. Doofenshmirtz grinned at his small triumph (although the more evil part of him was just grinning at the look on Perry's face), and a heartbeat later, the ray gun was dropped back into its owner's hands as he took off again. "Thanks!"

Baljeet blinked with wide eyes, his face the very picture of confusion. "…What just happened?"

Meanwhile, when the guard had been hit, Perry had fallen face-forward to the ground, and with his hands tied behind his back, he was finding it hard to get back up. He chattered furiously and managed to roll over just as a large shadow came over him, and his eyes widened as he was suddenly scooped up and tucked under someone's arm like a furry, teal football. Of course, no platypus likes being picked up unexpectedly against his will, upside down to boot (except, perhaps, for the more mindless ones, who probably aren't aware that it's happening in the first place), and Perry struggled madly as he was rushed off. However, as he watched the feet below him run, he noticed the tail of a white lab coat swishing around its wearer's legs and paused, surprised.

_Doofenshmirtz? _he balked, raising an eyebrow in confusion. _What the-?_

Unfortunately for the doctor, Perry was not of a particular mind to trust his nemesis at that moment, and he immediately suspected that he was being recaptured, which only made him struggle harder. Doofenshmirtz, of course, wasn't doing anything of the sort, and he had a difficult time keeping Perry under one arm and the device under the other already without him flailing around so much. So with many a cry of, "Sssh!" and, "Cut it out! You'll fall on your face again if you keep that up!" (the latter of which actually seemed to have an effect, surprisingly), he finally managed to rush behind a leftover machine, where they were hidden from view, and set the feisty platypus down.

Needless to say, Perry was not inclined to sit quietly. As soon as he was positioned on the floor (well, dropped, really- but with the fuss he made, the doctor didn't have much of a choice) he growled under his breath and gave the doctor a swift kick in the shins, which made him yelp loudly.

"Geez, what was _that _for?" he complained, doubling over in pain. "I totally just _saved _you back there and- whoa, whoa, whoa, where are you going now?"

Perry, who had turned around and was now headed back to the battle, only responded by stopping to turn around for a moment, as if to say, "What is it now?" Thankfully, it was just long enough for Doofenshmirtz to fit in a few extra convincing words.

"Okay, never mind that. Look, if you run back out there, you're not gonna be able to do anything. Not with that big, clunky thing around your neck, anyway. And besides, I have this really great plan that you have to hear!"

This time, Perry raised an eyebrow. Well, it was true that he couldn't do much with that stupid collar still hanging around his neck; but on the other hand, he was still feeling very upset and a little out of sorts, and he was sure that listening to one of Doofenshmirtz's long monologues wouldn't help. Especially not in the middle of a battle, when Phineas and Ferb were mere feet away and miraculously alive. He was dying to run back to them and find out what had really happened, but before he could do so, Doofenshmirtz took his momentary pause as a signal to continue and began to launch into his explanation.

"Good! So, here's the plan," he said excitedly, voice raised slightly to be heard over the commotion. Perry chatter-groaned and looked skyward, anxious to get back to the boys and unwilling to hear another harebrained scheme. "First off, I know you're mad at me, but let's face it, you're always mad at me. And I'm getting kind of sick of it- but that can wait for later. You know that plan that the Rebellion was making, where they go back in time and change the past? Well, some of our LOVE MUFFIN guys found that machine that they were gonna use, and I was thinking we could just do the plan for them!" He grinned excitedly, as if the idea was a casual scheme he had come up with for his own enjoyment. "I mean, I have no idea what exactly they were gonna do, but _you _probably do, 'cause you're important to them or whatever and they tell you everything. They did tell you, right? 'Cause if they didn't, then this whole thing is pretty much pointless and we should probably just, I don't know, run for it or something."

Perry nodded impatiently, trying to stop the panicky flood of words pouring out of his nemesis. Yes, he was well aware of this plan and wasn't surprised that LOVE MUFFIN had found out about it- but the really surprising part was that Doofenshmirtz actually wanted to put it into action. It was weird enough when he had mentioned escaping from jail in their last talk, but this was just bewildering. Doofenshmirtz was evil, wasn't he? So why in the world did he want to _help _Perry? They were mortal enemies, he had just betrayed him not a day ago, and they were even on worse relations than usual at the moment (not to mention, Doofenshmirtz didn't seem to be aware of the whole this-future-and-everyone-in-it-gets-deleted-if-you-change-the-past thing). It just seemed so strange and out of character, and Perry was having a hard time believing it.

It must have showed in his face, because Doofenshmirtz's excitement faded slightly. "You don't believe me, huh?" It was to be expected, after all. Perry wasn't one to believe people who had tried to destroy him multiple times. For a moment, he was silent, although the look in his eyes replied with a definite _yes _(maybe even more of a _well, duh_). It didn't surprise Doofenshmirtz at all- on the contrary, he just grinned.

"Yeah, I didn't think you would. But if you think I'm messing with you, then check _this!_" And with that, he presented the device that Professor Periwinkle had brought in earlier, in all its perfectly-polished, expertly detailed, highly-complicated mechanical glory. Perry's eyes widened, and he gave a small gasp. He knew the device, even though he had only seen it once, and it was very recognizable- without a doubt, it was the Temporal Transmitter Ten-Thousand, revved up and ready to transport someone through the boundaries of time and space. He stared at it in awe for a moment, amazed that Doofenshmirtz had really brought it- and that he was actually serious about the plan, or so it seemed. Doofenshmirtz just grinned a large, sheepish, rather goofy grin, and set the machine down on the floor.

"You probably think I'm crazy for wanting to bring down LOVE MUFFIN or whatever, but that's not really the case," he began to explain. "Remember when you visited me at the Rebellion's jail, and I said I just wanted things to go back to normal? Well, I meant that. Like, for real. 'Cause I've been thinking about the whole thing, and it's actually not that fun ruling the Tri-State Area when you have to share it with other people- and let's be honest, Rodney somehow got to be in charge, so he does most of the ruling anyway. It gets pretty boring, honestly."

Perry just stared through the whole explanation, wondering if he could really believe what he was hearing. Was this really his nemesis?

"Oh!" Doofenshmirtz stopped short suddenly, as if he had just remembered something important. "Oh, and there's something else, too…" And he reached into one of the large inner pockets of his lab coat and fumbled around for a moment. Perry narrowed his eyes and cocked his head, wondering what else he had in there. He doubted it was anything dangerous, but he still felt a little suspicious about it.

Before long, Doofenshmirtz seemed to have found what he was looking for- and out of the deep pocket, he pulled a small chocolate-brown fedora, Translator-Inator and all. Perry blinked, momentarily stunned, and watched as his nemesis raised it up and placed it back on its owner's head carefully. Doofenshmirtz backed away, smiling in a slightly embarrassed way, and folded his hands in his lap awkwardly, waiting for a reaction.

Now Perry was _sure _something was up with his nemesis- but he didn't really mind. He was quiet for a moment as he looked up at the familiar underside of the brim, his eyes beginning to sparkle. At length, he coughed quietly to test the translator, and said in a slightly scratchy but unexpectedly delighted tone, "My hat…!"

And then, with a hint of a smirk, he added, "Are you feeling okay? You haven't hit your head or anything, or gotten hit with some kind of 'Nice-Inator'?"

Doofenshmirtz chuckled quietly under his breath. "No, no. Don't worry. If you must know, I just _really _want to get back to trying to destroy you."

This time it was Perry's turn to laugh softly, which had a kind of chattery quality to it. It was a sound that Doofenshmirtz had heard at least once, maybe twice, in all the time he'd known Perry- and he couldn't help but reflect awkwardly that if they hadn't been working together to end this future, he should have liked to hear it more often.

"You didn't even try to destroy it, or flatten it, or anything," Perry mused, his tone rather touched. "I'm beginning to worry about you."

Doofenshmirtz shook his head, seeming rather disgusted with the thought. "Well, of course not! It's a hat, it's totally helpless. I'm not _that_ cruel, you know. Oh, and while I'm at it, I really didn't have anything to do with that invasion of the camp yesterday. And if you don't believe me…well, you know Rodney, right?"

Perry narrowed his eyes again and scowled. The name was spoken with a kind of loathing in it, and although he had only seen its owner thrice during his time in the future, none of their meetings had been anywhere near pleasant. Even in the past, he had known that the other scientist was kind of a jerk. Doofenshmirtz scowled too, sharing the sentiments. "Turns out those pins he gave us-" he unpinned the little cupcake-shaped thing as he spoke and held it up for Perry to see- "-actually had some purpose. There were trackers in them, and Rodney used mine to follow us all the way to the rebel camp. Then he sent some guys to get me, and honestly, I thought they were gonna throw me in jail or something! I was totally bewildered."

Even though he was mostly just paying attention to the explanation Doofenshmirtz was offering him, Perry couldn't help but smirk inwardly at the thought of the man being scared of his own guards. What a goof he was.

"Oh, and you know what else? I actually just found out about how he told you your family was dead or whatever," Doofenshmirtz continued, unfazed. "I mean, jeez! What a jerk! That's not evil, that's just mean (and I know they usually go hand-in-hand, but there actually is a very fine line when you think about it). And, more importantly, it's clearly not true, because they just broke in through the ceiling! And they definitely couldn't do _that _if they were dead! …At least, I'm pretty sure. Unless you made some kind of 'Zombie-Inator' or something…" he paused for a moment and stared off into space, as if considering whether such a thing could serve any evil purpose. Perry, alarmed by the very idea, snapped his fingers loudly to bring him back down to Earth.

"Oh, right! So basically, Rodney's a big fat liar and can't be trusted." He accompanied this statement with a conversational flip of the hand, and immediately shifted topics. "So, did you teach them to break through the ceiling like that? Your family, I mean. 'Cause I know they're rebels and all, but you're practically an expert on breaking walls and stuff- and, y'know, I still don't get how you're related. Those kids don't look anything like you…"

Perry, who had stopped listening when Doofenshmirtz went off on a tangent, now looked rather unsettled and rather upset, and he was beginning to realize the truth in these words. And, now that he was a little calmer and had some evidence in front of him, he realized that it would sort of make sense if Doofenshmirtz hadn't been involved in his capture. There wasn't all that much reason for this theory to be true (except that he seriously doubted his nemesis' ability to come up with an acceptable plan to capture him once and for all), but he just had some kind of feeling that told him the man wasn't at fault. And Perry trusted his instincts.

"Still, I, ah…I still feel kind of bad about how everything turned out," Doofenshmirtz continued uncomfortably, frowning in a melancholy way and staring at some obscure place off to his left. "I mean, I didn't want any of this to happen any more than you did. And, um…well, you'll think I'm getting soft, but I'm…I'm kinda…" he gulped. He never had been good at this kind of thing, and it was even harder when he was saying it to Perry. Eventually, he just gave up and said, "…well, I'm sorry."

Total silence. Perry just stared with wide eyes, stunned by the apology. Doofenshmirtz's mood had shifted rapidly from lighthearted to regretful very quickly, and he was now examining the floor beneath them with renewed interest, as if he had never seen anything quite like it before. Somewhere beyond them, a minion yelled hoarsely and fired a stunning beam with a loud _BANG._ A shrill scream could be heard, presumably from either Isabella or Baljeet (though the latter seemed more likely)- or, possibly, another minion. The momentary quiet (that being a relative term) seemed to continue for much longer than it did, but eventually, Perry decided to break it.

He wasn't the greatest at apologies either, which was only owed to the fact that he'd never been able to speak until a few days ago. And he certainly hadn't done much apologizing during that time. But it didn't take much, and he wasn't scared to try.

He cleared his throat with a chirp-ish kind of noise. Doofenshmirtz looked up, his attention snapping to Perry immediately. Perry held the gaze uncomfortably, took a quick breath, and spoke. "I…I'm sorry, too," he admitted, his voice low and his tone uncomfortable. He wasn't entirely sure why, but he just sort of _was._

Doofenshmirtz blinked, looking rather stunned. "Well, why are _you _sorry? You didn't do anything. And you can't exactly be sorry for getting captured and subjected to verbal torture straight from Rodney- well, then again, you could, but you'd have to be seriously neurotic to try to apologize for that."

Perry was really only listening to the first part, and it was the first part that he responded to. "Well…I kind of yelled at you a lot, before, and I hardly listened to anything you said. I just figured that warrants an apology."

"Well, if that's the case, then I think we'll have a _lot _more apologizing to do," Doofenshmirtz said with a laugh, the grin returning sheepishly. "I used to yell at you all the time, remember? And don't think I don't notice when you space out during my backstories."

Perry smiled grudgingly, recalling several boring-beyond-belief flashbacks that he had practically slept through (some of which he actually had). And, of course, Doofenshmirtz did tend to yell a lot when his scheme wasn't going the way he wanted, or he was just plain mad at Perry for breaking something. Still, it felt good to get that apology off his chest. It was relieving, somehow, almost freeing, and Doofenshmirtz, who appeared to have renewed his confidence somewhat, seemed to feel the same. After all, if they were all going to disappear, Perry didn't want to disappear with a guilty conscience.

"So…I guess we should do the forgiving bit now…" Doofenshmirtz thought out loud, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "I'll be honest, it's kind of weird when you're forgiving your worst enemy for something. We're totally going against the norm here."

Perry considered it for a moment, then smiled wanly and shrugged as best he could (the metal collar was still weighing on his neck and shoulders heavily). "Well, we tend to do that a lot."

Doofenshmirtz was silent for a moment, but he quickly returned the smile. That was all they needed, anyway- the gesture was quiet and meaningful, and it got the message across (sort of like Perry himself).

Suddenly, the sound of appreciative clapping broke the silence. "Bravo," said a quiet, British-accented voice.

"Encore!" added a more enthusiastic-sounding one, projecting a strong image of a huge grin with the one word. Perry gasped at the sound and turned quickly, the chain clinking as his face lit up with joy. There behind him were Phineas and Ferb, clapping happily and smiling like they'd seen the whole thing. In a moment, they had stopped clapping and kneeled down with their arms wide, and Perry did not hesitate to rush into them with an elated chatter.

"Phineas, Ferb!" he exclaimed joyfully, his voice a little choked. "You're alive! And you're free! But…but how…?"

"It was all Candace and Vanessa," Phineas explained, while Ferb pulled out a hairpin and went to work on Perry's chains. "The two of them came up with this great plan to rescue us, and they were going to rescue you, too, but it didn't work. We just got out last night, and then Vanessa called and told us about the execution, so we had to get ready as fast as we could. I'm just so glad we got here in time!"

"And you're okay," Perry said quietly, still seeming rather stunned by this. "You're- well, you're not- well, it's just that they told me you were dead, and that you left me and tried to escape on your own…"

"What?" Phineas seemed shocked at the very thought, and more than a little offended that such a lie had been told about them. "Oh, Perry, that's just terrible! And it's not true, not at all. We would never, ever abandon you, no matter what."

Perry nuzzled the boy's shoulder, his eyes getting hot again as a huge, trembling smile spread across his face. "I should have known in the first place…"

As he spoke, the metal collar fell away with a dense _thunk, _and the handcuffs with it. After all, there was practically nothing that could withstand Ferb's mad lock-picking skills, provided he had a hairpin on hand. Perry shook himself lightly and flexed his fingers, smiling up at his boys. Phineas' smile returned in full strength, and he released him from the hug and turned to Doofenshmirtz instead.

"Hey, Doctor D!" the redhead greeted him cheerfully, giving a little wave. Doofenshmirtz, who had been sitting quietly and awkwardly during the reunion, just froze, not quite sure what to do. From what he had heard about the rebel leaders, they were two boys to be _feared- _but the way they comforted Perry and hugged him so tightly, you'd never know. Besides that, he couldn't help but wonder if they'd be mad at him for putting them in jail, distressing their platypus, tearing apart that jail cell back at their camp while looking for spare parts, and generally making a mess of things. However, Phineas either didn't notice his uncomfortable stance or didn't mind, because he continued anyway. "You probably don't remember my brother and I, but we remember you (it's a long story). I admit, we were kind of hesitant about meeting you again, and we were worried that you might've changed for the worse over the last eight years- but after that little moment, I think you're good. Ferb says he's convinced- and when Ferb says something is true, it's true."

Doofenshmirtz blinked. He wasn't exactly sure what that meant, but one thing was certain- the rebel boys weren't mad at him. He was off the hook.

Still not sure what to say, he just shrugged with a small smile. "Well, if the green-haired kid says so…"

Phineas nodded happily, glad that he was catching on. Then he glanced down at the Triple-T, abandoned on the floor and generally not being useful. Upon seeing it, he took a quick little breath in and his face brightened.

"Ooh, there it is, Ferb!" he exclaimed, pointing at the device. "Wow, you really did bring it! Nice job."

At first, Doofenshmirtz just nodded, looking quite proud of himself. "Well, of course I did! Ah, not that I actually brought it in here myself, Periwinkle did that (have I introduced you to him, Perry the Platypus? Well, I should sometime, you've just _got _to hear his wacky voice), but I asked him to, so I definitely deserve some credit too-" but mid-sentence, he stopped and raised an eyebrow. "Wait, how did you hear about that? I thought you were out there zapping stuff with your laser things!"

"We were," Phineas explained calmly. "Ferb was just listening at the same time- although I hope you don't think we were eavesdropping."

Doofenshmirtz just stared, mouth half open, looking rather baffled. Eventually, he stuttered, "Well, isn't it kind of _loud?_"

At that very moment, there was a loud _CRASH_ that sounded as if someone had just felled a tree off to their right somewhere, and they all flinched. Phineas grinned awkwardly. "Um, yes. Yes, it is. But this is Ferb we're talking about!"

Ferb smiled a small, flattered smile as Phineas directed his own sunny grin at him, and Perry commented flatly, "Super hearing. Don't ask."

Doofenshmirtz nodded slowly, and decided to take Perry's advice. "Okay, whatever. So you guys heard all about my idea?"

"Sure did!" answered Phineas brightly, the confidence reentering his voice like a very bright light bulb coming on suddenly. "And Ferb gives it a double thumbs up!"

Ferb promptly performed this action with as much enthusiasm as he could generate without changing his blank expression, and Doofenshmirtz decided to take that as a good thing. "Great! So, since you guys so conveniently know how to use this thing-" he jabbed a thumb at the Triple-T, which Perry had now picked up and handed to Ferb- "we can just go ahead and get started, right?"

Phineas bit his lip. "Uh, yeah, about that…see, the thing is, when we made the Triple T, it was hard to make it particularly energy-efficient. We did the best we could, but it still takes a heck of a lot of power, so we were planning to plug it in when we used it. The battery isn't real strong, either…in hindsight, I guess we shouldn't have listened to Kenny's advice. He _is _the one who thinks we're potatoes."

Doofenshmirtz's eyes widened in shock, and his voice began to flood with panic. "Wait, wait- are you saying that it doesn't have enough power?"

Phineas nodded grimly. "Yep. At best, it'll probably only fire one shot."

"Well, can't we just fire it at a wall and make a portal-gateway thingy?" asked Perry hopefully. "You said it could do that too- oh, stop looking so exasperated, Doof. You would've done exactly the same thing. We're just lucky Ferb's too smart for self-destruct buttons."

"Never again," Ferb shook his head. Doofenshmirtz, who had been gaping at the boys' obvious oversight, closed his mouth quietly.

"That's a good idea, Perry, but we don't have a proper surface," Phineas explained sadly. "You have to fire it at a special kind of metal, like we had back at home base. Of course, we could just go back and get it…"

"Um, hate to rain on your parade," Doofenshmirtz interjected, "but Rodney figured that thing wasn't important. And when Rodney figures stuff isn't important…well, nobody ever really sees it again."

Phineas shut his eyes and winced. "Ouch. Well, then we're back to the one shot scenario. The good news is, we _will_ be able to send somebody back in time. The bad news is…only one person can go."

Perry furrowed his brows, alarmed. The mission was going to change considerably if Phineas and Ferb couldn't go together, as he knew they didn't perform as well alone. Of course, Doofenshmirtz was of no help either, and that only left…

Phineas seemed to read his mind. He sighed, his face grim and a little sad. "I know what you're thinking, Perry- and honestly, Ferb and I have been thinking, too."

Perry looked up from his thoughts, slightly apprehensive. He remembered what Phineas had said before, about how it was too risky, and they couldn't bear to lose their pet again. It was a bitter memory, but the expression on the boy's face was not the same stubborn frown he had shown on that gray afternoon.

"We don't have much time," Phineas began, stating the obvious. "And honestly, I don't think we have any option but to go through with this plan right away. If we retreat, they'll follow us the whole way, and if we stay and keep fighting, they'll overwhelm us eventually. This is the last stand; and the only thing we can do is send someone back to the past before they can stop us."

Perry took a deep breath. "Phineas, I know you and Ferb are worried it'll be dangerous. And I know the risks I'll be facing are great. But there's no other way now…"

"I know- and man, do I wish things hadn't turned out the way they did," said Phineas regretfully. "But you're right- there is no other way. And we've realized something else, too- when you came back, Ferb and I swore we'd never let anything happen to you again (and we all know how well that went). But instead of just protecting you, we wound up smothering you; and that really jumped out at us when Candace rescued us from jail. All these years, we've been trying to protect her, too- but then she single-handedly led a prison break and saved us, and now she's even helping to lead our forces down there!"

At that moment, if you listened carefully, you might have heard an extremely faint battle cry that sounded vaguely like, "BUSTED!"

"It'll be dangerous," Phineas reminded him. "We think we know who the saboteur is, but we can't be sure- and although Ferb and I aren't sure that everything will disappear if you change the future, we still don't know what'll happen. We might all vanish from existence- or, we might all appear in a better future. But there's still the chance that, even once you reach the past, you'll disappear."

Behind him, Doofenshmirtz's eyes widened and he gasped in a sort of, "Wait, _what?_" way, but no one noticed. Perry's face was set, and although his frown was gentle, it was firm. "It's too important to back down now," he told Phineas grimly. "I have to risk it."

Phineas was quiet for a moment, and he sighed heavily. When he looked back up, a concerned but hopeful smile was beginning to spread across his face. "Do what you need to do, Perry," he told his pet, putting a hand on his soft-furred shoulder. "But be careful- even if you are a secret agent, we still worry about you."

"But only because we love you," said Ferb placidly, giving a small, warm smile.

Perry tried to smile confidently, but after all he had gone through, and after realizing this was the last time he would see the boys, he found it too hard. His eyes grew hot once more, and Ferb was quick in wrapping his arms around him in embrace. Phineas joined in, wearing a loving smile, and even Doofenshmirtz patted his nemesis on the back awkwardly. For a moment, they stayed like that, just savoring the last moments they would all spend together; the last moments of their world.

* * *

><p>While this was going on, the boys' friends had been holding off the flood of LOVE MUFFIN minions to give their leaders more time. They weren't really sure what Phineas and Ferb were doing, but whatever it was, they were sure it was important and had to do with rescuing Perry- so they were all fighting as hard as they could.<p>

"Phineas and Ferb are certainly taking their time!" Baljeet complained bitterly, shrieking loudly as he blasted an oncoming minion away with his SPG. "When do you think they will be done?"

"I don't know, but I hope sometime soon!" said Isabella nervously. As she spoke, she deftly swept one attacker's feet and spin-kicked another in the face, knocking them into a pile on top of each other (Phineas and Ferb weren't the only ones who had learned to fight- but then, Isabella had been deadly from the beginning). "How have we been holding these guards off for so long, anyway?"

"Too long!" exclaimed Baljeet. "Far too lo-oo_ooooOOONG!_" His voice escalated into a scream as one minion managed to knock the boy's weapon away, and the others began to corral him towards the wall.

"Baljeet!" shouted Isabella, beginning to run to her friend's aid. Buford ran after her, but on his way there, someone stuck out a leg and managed to trip the bully, who fell with a _CRASH _and knocked Isabella clean off her feet. The two of them rolled all the way to the wall beside Baljeet, and the minions surrounded them in the blink of an eye.

"Oh, nooooo!" Baljeet wailed. "Doomed! We are _doomed!_"

"Quick, somebody shout or something!" said Isabella, cupping her hands around her mouth. "Phineas! PHINEAS!"

Baljeet tried to call for help with her, but it came out as an incomprehensible squeak. Buford, on the other hand, snapped his fingers and grinned.

"Cut the screaming," he growled, giving Baljeet a sinister sideways glance with that unsettling smile. "I got a better idea."

Baljeet's pulse quickened in fear, and he gulped. "Oh, I do not think I will like this idea…"

"No, no you won't."

* * *

><p>"<em><strong>AAAAAAIIIIEEEEEE!"<strong>_

The shrill, ear-piercing scream gave Perry and the boys such a shock that they all jumped apart with several yelps of alarm, and Doofenshmirtz covered his head instinctively in self-defense.

"What _was _that?" he exclaimed shakily. "Is somebody strangling a seagull out there or something?"

"No, I think it was Baljeet!" said Phineas, stunned. "That's the signal- we're in trouble!"

But before anyone could ask what kind of trouble they were in, several guards ran around to the back of the machine, each carrying a stun gun and a pair of handcuffs, and seized the boys before they could do anything. Phineas yelled loudly and began to struggle, and even Ferb scowled and tried to Vulcan pinch his captor, but his hands were restrained.

Perry shouted in horror and leapt at the men instantly, but within moments, more guards had swarmed over and seized him as well- and it wasn't long until all three of them had been overwhelmed and restrained.

Doofenshmirtz did not react as quickly as his nemesis, and at first, he only stared in shock. However, he soon recovered his wits and scrambled to his feet, wondering with a panicked mind what in the world he was supposed to do.

"Doof!" came Perry's voice, clear and sharp as ice. "The Triple-T! Quick!"

The look on his face said it all, and for once, Doofenshmirtz got the message immediately- but he knew that it wouldn't work. He had no idea how to work the machine, and besides, he'd never get a clear shot at Perry while those guards were wrestling with him. If only there was some other way…

"Are you _crazy_, Doof? Don't just stand there!" Perry shouted desperately.

Doofenshmirtz stared at the machine, and then at the Disintevaporator-Inizer. Suddenly, a brilliant idea materialized in his head. An idea so unlikely, so totally, completely, inexorably _bonkers- _that it might actually work.

"I _must_ be crazy if I'm really gonna try this," he muttered. Then, with hardly a moment's hesitation, he swept up the device, turned on his heel, and dashed away before you could blink. Head buzzing with anticipation and panic, Perry watched as his nemesis sprinted across the room, headed straight for the huge, gleaming Disintevaporator-Inizer, which had been left unattended. The guards either didn't notice or didn't care about him and the machine, because no one reacted when he disappeared behind the Inizer and knelt to the ground. Perry's face twisted into the very picture of upset confusion, and he stared hard at the machine as if he could reveal his nemesis' motives just though staring. But nothing happened- and just when he was beginning to wonder if Doofenshmirtz wasn't getting cold feet and trying to _hide_ behind the big, stupid thing, he and the boys were dragged roughly out to the center of the room. Isabella, Baljeet, and Buford were already there, handcuffed tightly and held in place by several guards.

"Great job, nerds," said Buford with a glare. "Now we're all toast."

"What were you _doing _back there, anyway?" Baljeet asked, his rebel uniform a little rumpled and his face scrunched up in pain. "Having a family reunion?"

Perry narrowed his eyes in a sort of reproving way, partly at the guards and partly to remind Baljeet to be polite, but Phineas merely frowned gently. "I'm sorry, guys." His voice was low and sincere, despite the panicked and slightly let-down expressions on his friends' faces. "We had important things to discuss. If we'd just had a little more time…"

"Yes, well, I'm afraid you're all out of that."

The loud voice commanded their attention, and the six of them all turned to face the center of the room. Rodney had reassembled the scientists and ordered most of them back to their seats (except for a few that had been knocked out in the struggle), and he was now standing before them, the towering Disintevaporator-Inizer arched menacingly behind him. A little ways in between was Doofenshmirtz, who had finished whatever he was doing and was now standing anxiously by the machine. Apparently he hadn't been discovered trying to help the boys, Perry noticed, so that was good- but on the other hand, he had lost the Triple-T to several guards, who were now holding the confiscated device securely and standing in the corner of the room. The distance between them and the prisoners was too far, Perry noted, to sprint away and grab the machine, and even so, what then? They'd be caught immediately. Even Doofenshmirtz wasn't making any attempt to get the device back from them; if anything, he didn't seem to care about it at all. Perry grit his teeth and took a nervous breath. He couldn't fathom what would happen next, if they couldn't get to the device in time or manage to escape; for all he knew, they really were trapped. This could very well be the end, unless the boys had any clever plans left…

"Well, well, well, look what we've got here," Rodney intoned with almost lazy ease, catching Perry's attention once more. "Five rebels and a blue furball, all out of clever plans. Quite a sight, eh, boys?"

The scientists behind him all mumbled a bit to themselves, looking quite disgruntled. Some just laughed, mirroring Rodney's triumphant (albeit slightly ruffled) smirk. Doofenshmirtz just muttered quietly, "It's teal, you moron…"

Phineas narrowed his eyes and scowled. He never got angry at his friends; but towards this jerk, the frustration and detest gleaming in his eyes was fully justified.

"Well, I'd say our plan worked just brilliantly," Rodney commented in a smooth tone of voice, although his deep, uneven breathing said he was still a bit unsettled. "Now we've got you-" he pointed at Perry, who bared his teeth and growled in a low tone at him- "and your little friends, too!" And he gestured at everyone else, who gave him the same sort of scowl, more or less. "Isn't it nice that we're all together? It just seems so…" he paused for a moment, giving a nicely dramatic weight to the sentence. "…_climactic._"

"You won't get away with this!" Isabella cried angrily, her eyes narrowed angrily at the man in defiance.

"Yes, what she said!" Baljeet agreed, although he still seemed sort of petrified. Buford just grunted menacingly.

Rodney laughed, clear gleaming light dancing across his big, bald head. "Oh, you three are just so _typical!_" he chuckled."Yes, they all say that. But we always get away with it anyway, you know."

As he spoke, he turned around and ascended the Disintevaporator-Inizer's steps, then stepped into the cockpit and took his seat. "And it will be no different this time…"

Doofenshmirtz's eyes widened as he watched, and he opened his mouth as if to argue, but Rodney cut him off before he could begin. "Oh, and Doofenshmirtz- since you seem content to just sit and stare at your nemesis instead of eliminating him like you were _supposed _to, I think I'd better handle this. That way, we can just get it over with before anyone else tries to disrupt us. You aren't having second thoughts or getting _soft, _are you?" The word was spoken like a sneering accusation, and Doofenshmirtz bristled at the sound of it. However, he did not retaliate; he just shook his head in dissent.

Rodney raised an eyebrow at him and gave him a funny look, but he brushed it off quickly. "Well, this is it, folks; the end of all our troubles with the Rebellion, at last!"

A loud and violent cheer rose from the stands behind him, the crowd eager to get going. Phineas knitted his eyebrows, looking truly panicked now, and Ferb began to struggle once more. Perry's eyes widened, and he felt his pulse quicken. They were out of solutions; Phineas and Ferb were caught, there was no one who could rescue them in time, and even Doofenshmirtz was free but powerless. He wasn't even _trying _to do anything- and was that a ghost of an agitated but hopeful smile that Perry saw on his face…?

As emotional turmoil began to seize Perry once more, the guards holding Phineas and Ferb pulled the boys and their friends away from him with a good deal of shouting and struggling, until he stood completely alone in the center of the room. Rodney grinned a huge, evil grin and seized the machine's controls. "The end, Agent!" he gloated. "Prepare to face your doom! Because believe me, you are doomed, doomed, doomed, doomed…"

He continued to repeat the word threateningly in a monotone voice, and when he showed no signs of stopping, Perry raised an eyebrow. He began to glance around the room in a panicky way, looking for a good escape route, and found nothing; but just as he was beginning to despair, he heard a loud whisper from the direction of the machine.

"Psst! Perry the Platypus!"

It was Doofenshmirtz. Perry looked up at him hopelessly, fear shining in his eyes. Doofenshmirtz met the stare with a shaky smile, and it seemed he was trying to comfort his enemy. "Don't worry- I know this looks like the end, but it's not."

Perry just stared back, incapable of speech and yet begging for answers and help. Doofenshmirtz continued to whisper at him, somehow unnoticed by anyone else. "You'll see- but hey, there's something I didn't get to tell you earlier. You know how I couldn't remember what that day eight years ago was?"

Perry narrowed his eyes just the slightest bit in confusion. Doofenshmirtz seemed a bit uncomfortable, but he continued anyway in a hurried tone. "Well, I didn't really forget- it was just that kind of thing where you walk out of the house and realize you forgot your keys, but then you realize that since you don't have the keys you can't get back into your apartment and so you just have to ring the doorbell, but then you remember that you live alone so that's kind of a dumb idea-" Here he paused, frowning, and said, "I-I'm sorry, I'm rambling again…but the point is, I really only forgot for a minute! I had a card for you and everything!"

Perry's eyes widened and he gasped softly, utterly dumbfounded. A mixture of surprise and awe gleamed in his eyes now, and an uncertain smile began to creep over his lips. Doofenshmirtz mirrored the smile. "So, what I'm trying to tell you is-"

However, in the middle of this, Rodney's continuing chant turned into, "…doomed, doomed, doomed…go home now."

He pressed a large, red button on the dashboard, and a loud whirring noise began to emanate from the machine, getting louder by the second. Phineas shouted Perry's name in terror and began struggling even harder, but the guards tightened their grip on his arms painfully and he squeaked. The others all stared in panic and horror, each trying desperately to get out of their bondage; all except for Ferb, who was staring at the tip of the laser that arched from the back of the machine. There was a puzzled expression on his features and he seemed to be just realizing something. Perry automatically glanced up at the laser to see what Ferb was looking at. It was aimed straight down at his hat, glowing bright blue and ready to destroy him at a moment's notice…

Wait.

Didn't the Disintevaporator-Inizer fire a _green laser?_

A little ways away from the machine, Doofenshmirtz's smile widened in an almost melancholy way. Perry looked from him to the laser and back in a stunned way, and Doofenshmirtz nodded silently in reply. Then, he cupped one hand to his lips and tried to speak one last time over the loud mechanical whirring.

"Thank you, Perry the Platypus," he called, a note of longing in his voice and the lonely smile on his face. "And…happy Neme-Versary."

Perry inhaled softly, stunned into wondering silence for a moment. Then, eyes filling with sparkling tears once more, he smiled up at his nemesis for the last time; a truly grateful, genuinely touched smile that shone in the clear morning light. Then there was a deafening, indescribable noise and a blinding flash of white-blue light…

And a heartbeat later, Perry was gone.

_To be continued…_

* * *

><p><em><em>D: PERREH!

...

NO SPOILERS. w

'Nother ATSD reference! :D Can anyone name it?  
>And speaking of references, that part with the 'doomed, doomed, doomed…' is a reference to Invader Zim. In the first episode, Mrs. Bitters says the universe is doomed, doomed, doomed, and then commands her class to "GO HOME NOW." XD<br>Oh, and I don't think Baljeet really sounds like a dying seagull…it's just sort of an inside joke (related, oddly enough, to a Justin Bieber song. XD No, I'm not a fan of his music). Although, it occurs to me that they seem to have planned out this particular signal beforehand… XD

The next chapter is the _very __last one! _I can't believe we've come so far! TwT  
>I'm not sure when it'll be out, but I'll do my best to have it out as soon as possible!<p> 


	23. The Final Mission

**Author's Notes:** HOMAHGAWSHUGAIZ

IT'STHEFINALCHAPTER

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH**

I don't know if I'm ready for all this… XD But oh, my goodness, it has been a horribly long time, hasn't it? As I post this, the first few seconds of June fourth, 2013 are ticking away, and that marks the two year anniversary of this fan fiction! Pretty awesome, especially considering that it both started and ended with Perry and Doof's Neme-Versary (whoops, spooooiillleeeers! But hey, you all knew he was going back in time anyway).

However, I am so, so sorry for keeping you all waiting for so long. I really didn't want the story to become one of those things that would never get finished, but thankfully for me, my family kept bugging me enough to make me write it whether I felt inspired or not. XD It was hard, but I think it was worth it!

Now, if you're reading this on fan fiction, you may or may not be aware that I've gradually been revamping the previous chapters in preparation for this one. Considering there will be lots of references to these, you may want to consider rereading them, just in case (but I know none of you will want to. xD)

But I shouldn't keep you waiting any longer. Without further ado, I give you; Time and Time Again; **The Final Mission!**

* * *

><p>Silence.<p>

Absolute _silence._

That was the first thing you would notice if you had just happened to walk in on the scene. The second, most likely, was the assembly of people all clumped into the cavernous, hall-like room. Around the back wall, bleachers stood solidly, covered with scientists in lab coats and wide, round goggles with wide-eyed expressions to match. The center of the room, though perhaps once occupied, was deserted besides a large machine, atop of which sat a bald old man wearing a big white coat and grinning demonically. Beside it stood another scientist with flyaway brown hair and deep bags under his dark blue eyes, his lab coat sitting a little askew on one shoulder and his mouth arranged in a strangely lonesome, lopsided smile. There were many guards by the doors, all armed heavily, and handcuffed and restrained by these guards were several teenagers, all of whom looked positively horrified.

The scene took a moment to register in Phineas' quick-thinking mind. It couldn't be. It just couldn't. Perry was too tough, too smart, too darn _awesome _to be taken down so easily. There was something else going on, there had to be…

But there was no denying the cold, hard fact that that huge, scary laser had just fired with a terrifying _**BOOM**_ and hit the little secret agent full in the face, and where he had stood before, there was now only a small plume of smoke rising from the ground. Perry had not dodged the blast, or even tried to- he had just let it come. And no one had done anything, _anything, _about it.

Phineas' eyes were already wide and terrified, and now they began to shine with tears. "Ferb!" he cried softly, turning to his blank-faced brother. Ferb was just staring at the scene with one eyebrow halfway raised thoughtfully, as if he had just put the last piece of a puzzle into place, and was making sure it fit properly. He blinked when Phineas called to him and turned to his right to face him.

"Ferb," Phineas entreated, horrified at the single thought that he couldn't get out of his mind. "It- it can't be real…Perry can't be…" he screwed his eyes shut to stop the rising flood, the terrible fever-hot feeling that meant it had to be true. "…gone…"

Ferb's answer was simple. He shook his head, fixed the emotional redhead with a sincere stare, and said in a low, plain whisper, "No, he's not."

Phineas just stared back at him in utter shock, a swell of fear and hope rising in his chest like the tidal wave they'd ridden as kids. Behind him, Isabella, Baljeet and Buford had all heard Ferb's statement, and they were just as shocked.

"What do you mean?" whispered Isabella, worried and stunned. "Is Perry okay somehow?"

"How is this possible?" Baljeet asked in utter bewilderment.

Ferb nodded very slightly so as not to be noticed by the guards and opened his mouth to explain- but just then, he was interrupted by a loud, "HA!" from the direction of the Disintevaporator-Inizer. It was Rodney- and he'd finally decided to start gloating again.

"At last!" he crowed, rising from his seat and turning to face the assembly with a twisted, triumphant grin. His wizened bald visage looked vaguely like some kind of martian. "At last, we have finished off our most dangerous enemy! The OWCA, formidable though it once was, has finally been crushed!"

And the room exploded in a burst of maniacal laughter, each scientist letting out his or her own callous cackle in a cacophony of credibly crazy chaos. However, in the midst of all this, there was a sudden sparking noise and a loud _BANG_, and a billowing cloud of smoke exploded from the back of the Disintevaporator-Inizer. Several scientists shouted in alarm, and Rodney nearly fell out of his seat in surprise. The guards, after a brief moment of confusion, rushed over to investigate, leaving just a few to watch the boys and their friends, who were rather startled and merely stared. For a few moments, no one moved or spoke- but eventually, one of the guards reemerged from behind the machine, holding a few snipped wires.

"Sir, someone appears to have tampered with the power core!" the man exclaimed, holding the wildly sparking wires up for his boss to see. Rodney gasped at the sight of them, let out a small shriek of distress, and dashed around to the back of the machine to inspect it for himself. The stepbrothers exchanged a quick glance, Phineas wide-eyed and confused and Ferb wearing a little half smile that said, _Just wait and see_. A few moments later, Rodney rose from the floor, wearing a scowl of pure outrage.

"Tampered with it, perhaps, isn't the best description," he fumed, his hairless brows furrowed in a rather comical manner. Even so, you could tell that he was _livid- _there might as well have been steam coming out of his ears. "It's been _removed- _and replaced with something entirely different!"

A huge gasp reverberated around the room, and the scientists' faces went from confused to shocked in a matter of seconds. Around the other side of the machine, Doofenshmirtz's eyes widened- but somehow, his expression didn't seem to match the others'. It wasn't so much shocked as just nervous, and it perhaps indicated fear of what might happen next.

"Sir, a report," said another guard, marching up to hold out another machine- the Triple-T, which was also sparking dangerously in the region of the control panel.

Rodney glared down at it as though it was a personal offense and cocked his head. "The rebels' time machine? Oh, for badness' sake, what is it now?"

"This one's had its power core tampered with as well," the guard reported grimly. "We suspect they might have been switched."

"_Switched!_" Rodney's expression was beyond rage. He seized the machine and began to examine it himself, clearly shaken. "But- but that means-!"

Despite this clearly being important, he didn't finish the sentence, instead electing to sputter furiously. The rest of the scientists seemed rather unnerved by now, but one of them stood up and cleared his throat anyway.

"It means wat, Wodneyh?" Professor Periwinkle inquired, his eyes large and round under the even-larger coke-bottle glasses that covered them. "Ish it bad?"

Rodney did not reply for a moment, too seething mad to do so. At last, he growled, "If the power cores were switched, then the functions of the machines would also be switched…and that means…"

"Perry's okay," Phineas breathed, relief spreading like a fresh breeze over his face. The other scientists all began to gasp and talk, the realization just dawning on them as well. Unlike Phineas, they were all wearing expressions of absolute horror- and Rodney was the worst.

"Do you realize what this means?" he demanded. "We've sent him back in time by accident, just as they planned to do! What are you all just standing there for, you fools? Turn that machine back on, we're sending someone to stop him at once!"

"Actually, Sir, it doesn't seem to be in working condition anymore," one of the guards spoke up timidly, cowed by his superior's incensed tone. "It's kind of smoking and some of the wires are melted…"

At this, the other scientists exploded into stressed conversation, all shocked by this sudden development. On the other hand, a huge grin stretched across Phineas' face, and he turned to his brother with glee. "Ferb, this is great!" he exclaimed, barely managing to restrict his tone to a whisper. "But…how did you know?"

A trace of a smile spread over Ferb's lips, and he began to explain. "Well, when we finished talking to Perry and you-know-who-" he began, but he was immediately interrupted by Buford.

"Wait, you guys were talking to Voldemort?" the bully asked in a husky whisper, thoroughly confused. "Or do you mean that bald dude? He looks similar enough."

Ferb sighed and gave a minute shake of the head 'no', and Phineas spoke up to answer his friend. "Not _the _you-know-who; him." And he gestured ever so slightly in Doofenshmirtz's direction. Upon following his exasperated companion's gaze, Buford's mouth widened into a perfect 'O' of understanding.

Ferb just glanced skyward, slightly miffed, and kept going as if he hadn't been interrupted at all. "When we finished talking, I saw him go behind the you-know-what holding the other you-know-what, and that's when he must have sabotaged the machine."

"You mean he was _helping_ us?" asked Isabella incredulously, her voice barely audible (unless you had super hearing). "I thought he was the enemy!"

Phineas, who had caught up so fast he might have read Ferb's mind, shook his head covertly. "No, but we need to keep pretending he is so he won't get in trouble-"

"Wait, are you saying that Perry's nemesisis actually on our side, and he switched the cores while no one was looking to save Perry?" Baljeet suddenly exclaimed, in a voice that was by no standards a whisper. "How could that be true? It makes no sense!"

But the moment the words left his lips, he gasped in horror. The others' eyes widened in fear, the guards' attention snapped to Baljeet like many pairs of very bright searchlights, and even Rodney, far away though he was, looked up sharply.

Phineas bit his lip, while Ferb just closed his eyes and let his head droop. "Smooth, Jeet."

Buford growled and turned to the nerd threateningly. "You know what else doesn't make sense? How you can be so smart at math, and yet so dumb when it comes to everything else."

Baljeet just gulped, an apologetic grin tugging at his lips. "Umm…I am sorry?"

Across the room, Rodney whipped around to face Doofenshmirtz, whose stunned face had suddenly become several shades paler. "Heinz," said the crooked-nosed scientist slowly. "Is this true?"

Doofenshmirtz, after a short pause in which he didn't seem to know what to do, shook his head frantically. "Whaaat? No! Man, are you kidding me? I'm one hundred percent evil, remember? Why the heck would I save my…my, ah…enemy…" But he trailed off quickly at the sight of his former rival, whose eyes were now gleaming darkly, bright as the shine on his slick bald head.

Rodney shook his head as well, now squinting at Doofenshmirtz with a glare that was hotter and more precise than a pinpoint laser. "Oh, I'm sure you wouldn't, Heinz…if you were half of the evil scientist most of us have become."

Doofenshmirtz's eyes darted from one side of the room to the other, as if seeking refuge. "Umm…so you believe me?" he asked hopefully.

Rodney just narrowed his eyes further, which was clearly not intended to be a good response. Doofenshmirtz's uncomfortable grin melted into a grimace of fear. Across the room, the rebels' guards shoved the obviously terrified Baljeet into the open. "Sir, should we try to get them to talk?"

"That won't be necessary," Rodney replied coldly. "Doofenshmirtz, your foolishness betrays you. I should have known…the shock you displayed when we pretended to fire you, the uncomfortable bumbling at that meeting, the trust you seemed to show in your nemesis…it was all sincere! How could it not be, when you're too stupid to fake it?"

Doofenshmirtz bristled slightly at this but kept his mouth shut, instead chancing a glance at the crowd of scientists on the bleachers, all of them staring at him in shock. In the stands, Professor Periwinkle's eyes had gotten even wider, if that were possible, and he looked quite comical. Across from him, Doctor Bloodpudding's bushy eyebrows were furrowed in an expression of indignation, and beside him, Doctor Diminutive had sort of swelled in horror. The others' expressions were more or less the same.

"And now, look what you've done!" Rodney exclaimed. "You've doomed us all! Don't you realize that if he changes the past, our future will end? We'll disappear from existence!" Now his voice was tainted not only with exasperation, but with panic. "After all the hard work we put in to build this empire- this amazing feat of pure _evil!_" Wringing his hands, he took a step closer to Doofenshmirtz, who shrunk away from his advancing rival in fear. "For badness' sake, _why,_" he stressed, "would you _deliberately_ tear it down?"

Doofenshmirtz bit his lip, unsure of what to say- or, indeed, whether to speak at all. He glanced around the room, at all the scientists staring accusingly at him, and at the rebels, who looked worried and afraid. Then, inexplicably, something changed in his face. It wasn't a huge change, nothing too significant; just the smallest realization, which, for him, probably seemed a great deal larger. He turned back to Rodney, brows furrowed and a stubborn frown set firmly in place.

"You know what, Rodney? I hope you're ready for a back-story, 'cause I'll tell you why," he snapped. Rodney's expression clearly said he wasn't looking forward to another one of the doctor's back stories, but he did not respond in time to prevent it, and Doofenshmirtz, looking determined, took advantage of the momentary pause to turn to the assembly and continue.

"So do you guys remember around eight years ago, back when we were all trying to rule the Tri-State Area?" he began. At first, no one seemed to know what to say, but soon a few people glanced at each other and nodded hesitantly. "Yeah, well, am I the only one who really enjoyed that- like, more than I'm enjoying the actual ruling?" Doofenshmirtz proposed. "I mean, not that ruling the Tri-State Area is bad or anything- well, technically it is, I mean, we _are_ evil- but it was nice back then, too. Making a new Inator every day, plotting against people, trapping my nemesis, the ensuing fight with said nemesis- I liked all of it. Well, except the thwarting bit. That wasn't so fun- but you get my point, right?"

Doofenshmirtz was a natural chatterbox, but he talked even more when he was nervous, and so his spiel was a bit much to take in for the scientists. Some nodded, while some just gave him odd looks, and one or two admitted, "Yeah, I guess so."

The tension in Doofenshmirtz's face seemed to lessen a bit. "See, I knew I couldn't be the only one!" he said with an air of relief. "And, hey, I don't know about you, but I don't really get to do that kind of stuff anymore- building Inators and making evil schemes, I mean. Have you guys been doing that recently?"

This time the scientists took a bit longer to deliberate. Slowly, one by one, they began to shake their heads. Clearly, Doofenshmirtz wasn't the only one whose life had declined a bit in the manner of excitement since the takeover.

Rodney, however, didn't seem to agree. He merely rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, saying irritably, "Heinz, you never listen, do you? The Tri-State Area is ours, has been ours for a long time, and would have continued to be ours had you not acted up all of a sudden. You could have done that whenever you felt like, had you been _intelligent _enough to think of it!"

Doofenshmirtz winced a little at the insult, but he shook his head resolutely. "Yeah, but it's just different when you're actually _allowed!_ I mean, evil is supposed to be against the rules, right? Without any resistance, it got sort of boring. No 'You'll never stop me!' or anything, no 'So there, I won!'. It's kind of lame."

"So you're not happy with all this power?" Rodney accused dramatically, as if it was a personal offense to all of them. Somehow, his nasal voice sounded even more whiny in his outrage. "You'd rather keep getting beaten down by that accursed nemesis of yours, instead of ruling the Tri-State Area?"

"Ruling would be fun if I was actually doing it, Rodney!" Doofenshmirtz retorted. "I mean, I never get to make any evil decisions, or have any monuments of myself built to honor me, or have people worship my evil-ness or anything. Nooo, it's all about the team! Well, I never really wanted to be part of an evil team, you know? I'll be honest, when we first took over I was thinking I'd betray all you guys and take the Tri-State Area for myself- oh, come on, who _wasn't _thinking that?" he added, glancing at the somewhat stunned-looking assembly. "It's in our evil nature!" Realizing the truth in his statement, the others quickly began to agree with only the slightest degree of shame. Doofenshmirtz spread his hands as if to say, _Duh!_

"Heinz, you truly are a fool!" said Rodney patronizingly. "If only one of us ruled, the others would keep grabbing for power- whereas if we all rule, no one gets left out. Clearly we work better together!"

"No, we don't! Evil doesn't do teams!" Doofenshmirtz argued. He addressed the other scientists once more. "I mean, why did _you _want to take over? So you could have a nice car? So you could get free sushi?" Then he paused, sighed, and added, "Yes, we all know _you _wanted free sushi, Miss Yakamoto."

Somewhere in the audience, an Asian woman shifted uncomfortably in her seat. Beside her, Professor Periwinkle offered a supportive pat on the back.

"The point is," Doofenshmirtz continued, "I wanted to take over so I could have all the power to myself, so I could get the recognition I deserved, so I could look Perry the Platypus in the face and tell him, 'You lose, sucker!' Well, that didn't exactly work out, huh? In fact, I only know one person who really did get all that- I'm looking at you, _Elizabeth!_"

A ripple of shock ran through the audience, and in the third row back, a young woman exclaimed and rose in sharp indignation. Doofenshmirtz, exasperated, hastily amended his sentence.

"No, no, no, not _you _Elizabeth- _him _Elizabeth!" he said, pointing dramatically at Rodney.

Rodney bristled, but surprisingly did not try to deny the name. No one else responded at all, merely opting to stare blankly at Doofenshmirtz, who, as far as they could tell, was losing his marbles.

Doofenshmirtz, apparently, had expected a bigger response. "You know…Aloyse Everheart Elizabeth blah blah blah? It's not my fault he drilled it into my head by saying it over and over!"

Rodney- or maybe Elizabeth- eyed his feet for a small moment. "…It was my mother's name."

Then, after a short pause, he gathered himself and barked, "Anyway, what are you saying, Doofenshmirtz?"

"I'm saying that we claimed to all be equal or whatever- but seriously, am I the only one who noticed that we're really not?" He said it as if it were perfectly obvious- which, to him, it clearly was- and it showed. The others blinked, confused, as he elaborated. "I mean, at first we were but then we just sort of weren't anymore. You know what I'm saying?"

The scientists exchanged confused glances, clearly looking for support from their peers. Apparently, no one knew what he was saying.

Doofenshmirtz rolled his eyes. "Come on, think about it! Who sits at the head of our table? Rodney! Who makes all the decisions, really? Rodney! Who's been making tracking badge things without telling the rest of us, _and_ forcing us to wear them, no matter how stupid they look?"

"Uh, he _did _tell us about that," Dr. Diminutive spoke up. "Were you not listening or something?"

"Whaaat? LOL Cats are my Achilles' Heel!" Doofenshmirtz protested, a light blush of embarrassment spreading over his cheeks. "Well, one of many, anyway- but that's not the point! Who makes all the announcements? Come on, who?"

Dr. Diminutive blinked and glanced around, hoping his colleague would look at someone else. Doofenshmirtz just kept his eyes trained on the doctor, waiting for a reply. Eventually, Diminutive said uncomfortably in a quiet voice, "Um, Rodney usually does."

"Yeah!" Doofenshmirtz agreed strongly. "And who's been making all our battle schematics and stuff? Tell me that!"

This time Professor Periwinkle spoke up, quickly joined by Miss Yakamoto and a few others. "Wodney has!"

"Who gets the first say in things and expects to be agreed with? Who has about a million monuments built to himself?" Doofenshmirtz was on a roll now, gathering confidence and speed like a snowball zooming down a hill. "Heck, he even gets to pick what kind of coffee we get in the lobby! Come on, people, who _is _this guy?"

This time, the response was much bigger- apparently Doofenshmirtz's words had actually gotten through to his audience. "RODNEY!" They called.

"Exactly!" he agreed heartily. "We're not ruling the Tri-State Area at all- _Rodney is!_"

Suddenly, everyone- even those who didn't seem quite sold yet- was staring at Rodney, who looked absolutely flabbergasted.

"Wh-what? I would _never_-" he stuttered. Then he stopped, held the pause for a moment, and took a quick breath. His eyes narrowed darkly. "Doofenshmirtz, your attempt at disguising your true motives is as bad as your choice in coffee! Which, by the way, is terrible," he said, with an air of disgust. "How do we know you're not going to just dethrone me and take the Tri-State Area for yourself?"

At this, the wide-eyed scientists immediately shifted their attention back to Doofenshmirtz, who retorted with determination, "Because I don't _want_ the Tri-State Area, Rodney!"

This remark, needless to say, was met with a loud gasp that reverberated around the room.

"No, wait, let me fix that- I don't want _this _Tri-State Area," Doofenshmirtz added quickly, trying to keep on their good sides. "I mean, seriously, this one already has a bunch of problems; like the obscene amount of statues dedicated to Rodney, the Rebellion, the fact that I miss my nemesis like crazy- oh! And worst of all, my daughter is a _psychiatrist!_ She's always psychoanalyzing me and stuff, it's driving me cuckoo!"

"Haowld aon, haowld aon," Professor Periwinkle interrupted, bemused. "Deed joo just saiy you meess your nemesees? I don't tink dat people do dat…"

Doofenshmirtz raised an eyebrow. "Well, yeah, why?"

Professor Periwinkle just stared.

For a few minutes, no one spoke.

Someone coughed discreetly in the background.

Doofenshmirtz, at length, just reddened a bit and snapped, "DON'T JUDGE ME!"

Then he sighed exasperatedly. "Look, what I'm saying is, I'd rather start fresh and conquer the Tri-State Area as I knew it eight years ago- back before all this crazy stuff happened. I want my old life back- and, yes, fine, my nemesis- and if you're too power-crazed to give it to me, Rodney, then I'll just have to take it!"

"Ridiculous, Doofenshmirtz!" Rodney snapped. "As if any of us believe a word you say!"

Doofenshmirtz just turned back to the assembly, who watched with stunned countenances. "No! I know I can't be alone in this, guys!" he asserted. Then, in a more vulnerable, coaxing sort of voice, he added, "Don't leave me hangin'…"

Rodney laughed harshly. "Hah! Do I even need to say how pathetic this is?" He turned to the others as well, immediately drawing their attention. "Come now, fellows. Is this story all nonsense, or is it just me?"

For a moment, no one did anything. The scientists stared from one rival to the other, trying to sort out their allegiances; the rebels stared with bated breath, mesmerized; and in the background, the guards wondered vaguely when their lives had become so insignificant. Eventually, someone seemed to recall all the things that had been said not a minute ago- and the reaction, though gradual in terms of size, was instantaneous.

"Heeey," came the slow, heavy realization. "Doofenshmirtz is actually right for once!"

"Yeah, this is no fun!" someone else joined in.

"I WANT MY MONEY BACK!"

"Booooo!"

"It's just you, Rodney!"

Soon the room was in an uproar, each scientist adding in his or her opinion as the volume escalated ever higher. Doofenshmirtz's face lit up in hopeful glee as he basked in the light of the fact that _they were actually agreeing with him_; these people, who had so often pushed him down just as much as everyone else, even when they had claimed to be on a team, were finally on _his _side for once. Now he just had to see it through until Perry the Platypus could finish his mission…

As all this was blooming around them, Rodney's face began to redden once more. Unshakable in his beliefs, he growled under his breath, "You think you can turn my own minions- ah, _colleagues- _against me?" he demanded, hastily covering his mistake. "You think you can overthrow me and rule instead?"

"I just said I didn't want to do that!" Doofenshmirtz protested, irritated. "Come on, Rodney, it's over anyway. Can't you just let me enjoy this before we all disappear?"

Rodney's eyes narrowed, and he gestured to the guard holding the Triple-T, who brought it over meekly, seemingly unsure as to whether his superior ought to be obeyed. "No!" Rodney snatched it out of his hands and held it threateningly. "No, I can't."

Doofenshmirtz raised his eyebrows, a little unsettled. "You can't seriously think I want to rule the Tri-State Area instead of you! Were you even listening to me that whole time? And besides," he added, with a swift glance at the machine held firmly in Rodney's gnarled fingers, "what are you gonna do with that, send me back in time with Perry the Platypus?"

"Oh, how sadly mistaken you are, you fool." Rodney's voice was a venomous hiss, dangerous and poisoned. "Don't you remember, this isn't a time machine anymore- not after your little sabotage attempt."

Doofenshmirtz's eyes widened, and he took a step back, realizing just what this meant. Rodney began to advance, and as he did, nearby guards began backing away fearfully.

"The Disintevaporator-Inizer…" Doofenshmirtz murmured in nervous understanding. "Oh, no."

"Oh, yes," Rodney answered with an uncanny grin. Without warning, he suddenly drew close and pressed the front of the machine up against Doofenshmirtz's chest. Doofenshmirtz attempted to step back again, but abruptly realized he had reached the wall faster than expected (perhaps the room wasn't quite so cavernous as it had previously seemed). He was trapped.

Rodney was breathing heavily now in his anger, face flushed and eyes like slits. "So you think it is over, and your little _friends _have won," he said maliciously, spitting out the word like a bitter cup of coffee. "But I won't let my empire fall so easily- not to _you!_"

There was a clicking and a growing whirr from deep inside the machine, and Doofenshmirtz's pulse accelerated with it. A green light peered out from where the face of the device was pressed against the thin black fabric of his shirt. Rodney's grin twisted at the corners cruelly.

"I have _always,_" he confided, "wanted to do this…" Every word of the sentence was a delicate instrument, a precise weapon with which to use on his helpless rival, and he let each of them sink in with a weighty air of finality. Doofenshmirtz began to panic, casting his eyes around the room desperately in a search for help. Professor Periwinkle had been the first of the scientists to really notice, but he was too far away to do anything. The rebels had noticed as well, and were now struggling to escape, but the guards had returned to hold them tightly. No one knew quite what to do, time was running out, and as Rodney reveled in this fact, it began to look like the end.

Desperately, without even consciously deciding it, Doofenshmirtz's hand flew to the side of the device and began to search along the smooth round metal for something. The whirring grew louder, louder even than all the sounds of battle from downstairs, louder than Rodney's sudden, deranged laughter- so loud that no one really heard when the threatened doctor's fingers unexpectedly came upon the item they had been seeking, and, with hardly a moment of thought, pressed down upon it with a small, utterly unnoticed _click._

First came a split-second of quiet, the calm before the storm.

Then came the storm.

An eardrum-shattering, painfully huge, louder-than-loud _**BOOM**_ rocked the room, leaving almost no time to cry out. Anyone with any sense dove for cover, while the rest just covered their ears. Rodney was blasted backward with the force of an elephant on steroids, Doofenshmirtz was flattened against the wall, and the Triple-T was simply there one second and not the next. The room was bathed in fiery scarlet, a scalding wind swept the area, and it all culminated into a mind-blowing climax of light and sound- which was all over in half a heartbeat.

The silence, though golden as silences are said to be, was more deafening than the explosion.

It took everyone a while to recover; but the first to do so were the boys and their friends, who had been sheltered by their heavily-armored guards, whom Ferb had expertly maneuvered to be their cover. Everyone looked a little crispy, the guards included; but to the boys, it was the cause that mattered, not the result.

"What _was _that?" Baljeet asked, eyes wide and hair standing on end wildly.

"I think it was the Triple-T!" Phineas exclaimed, surveying the blackened room in wonder. "But how-?"

Just then, Ferb tapped him on the shoulder, pointing to the blackest place in the room by far, where a once-white lab coat was stirring as its owner rose woozily. Turning to reveal his soot-covered but miraculously intact face, he blinked a few times and suddenly spotted his rival laying on the ground a good twenty feet away. Rodney was just as blackened as Doofenshmirtz, but unlike the other, he had apparently been knocked out in the blast. Doofenshmirtz stared for a moment, before shaking himself out of his stupor and cracking a lopsided grin.

"Ha! In your _face, _you jerk!" he taunted, sort of shaking a fist in weak triumph. Then, after a beat, he added, "…Literally!" and fell backwards into a sitting position.

Phineas opened his mouth and glanced at Ferb, who shrugged; but before either of them could get any further, there was another loud BANG and the double doors burst open, knocking the guards out of the way forcefully. Before anyone could even react properly (save for Professor Periwinkle, who promptly toppled out of his seat), an unexpected figure leapt into the room- Candace, a ray gun in her hand and a determined look on her face.

"Freeze!" she shouted, as a wave of rebels swarmed in behind her. "You're all under arrest for trying to kill my pet platypus!"

"Candace!" Phineas exclaimed delightedly, as Jeremy rushed over to untie him and his friends. "You made it!"

"Hope we're not late," Candace answered with a tired grin. "Traffic was terrible!" And she nodded back at the rebels, who were slowly filling the room and still coming strong. Apparently they had fought their way all through the building's stairwell until they reached the top floor- which explained how tired they all looked. The stairs alone were rather torturous.

"So where's Perry?" Candace asked, glancing around the room worriedly (she didn't seem to care about the obvious explosion that had taken place there). "Did you make it in time?"

Phineas grinned happily. "Sort of- but you can ask Isabella about that. Ferb and I have to go check in with Doctor D."

And as Isabella began to explain what had transpired, the boys rushed off to make sure the doctor was alright. He waved cheerily as they approached, looking rather giddy.

"Can you believe that worked?" he greeted. "I mean, Rodney was about to finish me off, and you guys thought I was doomed, and then all of a sudden- BANG! Showed him!" Then he laughed and added, "And Perry the Platypus said you were too smart for self-destruct buttons! Pfft. See, they _can _be useful!"

"I guess they can," said Phineas cheerily, as he and Ferb helped Doofenshmirtz to his feet. "But there's still something I don't understand- how did you know about the self-destruct button? Ferb and I installed that so we could keep it secret from LOVE MUFFIN if they ever got a hold of it (not that that worked out particularly well), but we never told anyone about it."

Doofenshmirtz shrugged. "I just figured- doesn't everything have a self-destruct button?"

Phineas just laughed good naturedly (although Doofenshmirtz didn't seem to get why), and Ferb rolled his eyes with a smile. "Well, it worked, and that's all that matters," he assured them. "Now the evil dictators are conquered, and we've won- on our side, anyway. Now we just have to count on Perry to get things straightened out in the past!"

Doofenshmirtz frowned. "Yeah, about that…so basically, he's going to prevent all this bad stuff from happening in the first place…"

"Uh-huh," Phineas nodded.

"And then this future will disappear or something…?"

"Yep."

"With us in it."

"That's about the size of it," Phineas confirmed grimly. "I hate to say it, but our very existence is about to end abruptly. This…is the end."

Doofenshmirtz stared blankly, as if wondering why he'd chosen to go along with this plan in the first place. "Remind me, why is this a good idea?"

Phineas looked uncertain, but he put on a brave face. "It'll be okay, don't worry about it," he assured the doctor, looking away out the window. "Everything's in Perry's hands now…"

And for a brief moment, all three of them were silent, praying for the success of their mission, hoping everything would work out.

"…"

"Why are we all staring out this window?"

"Shh! Dramatic effect."

* * *

><p><em>Elsewhere, tucked away in the metaphorical folds of time…<em>

Time travel- real time travel- was nothing like the Time Transporter-Inator had made it out to be.

Afterwards, had Perry tried to describe it, he would have found it terribly difficult- it happened so quickly, and it was so disorienting. The best he could come up with was that one moment, he had been staring the Disintevaporator-Inizer full in the face, bidding his nemesis a surprisingly melancholy adieu and praying the man had gotten whatever it was he'd done right- and then, he was hurtling through a vortex of light and sound and color, which would have been sort of beautiful if it hadn't made him want to vomit. Then, before he could so much as blink, it was gone- and he was dumped in a nauseous heap onto something very hard and flat.

The world spun in circles, and he struggled to push the static out of his head. Somewhere to his left, a voice was talking avidly about something, although to him it sounded far off and fuzzy. Slowly, he heaved himself to his feet, then stumbled and threw out his hands to stop his fall. To his surprise, they came to rest on some kind of metal surface- like a wall going straight up. It felt smooth and metallic and gradually curved, like a cylinder- and moments later, when his head cleared and he was able to look at it properly, he was stunned to find that the object in question was none other than the Time Transporter-Inator, fully intact and apparently still operational.

He stepped back with a small gasp and stared up at the machine through the tears still lingering in his eyes, unsure of what he was seeing. Did that mean his harebrained nemesis' plan had really worked? Doofenshmirtz had actually managed to save him- and send him back in time to boot? It struck him as rather a critical thought, but he couldn't help but be delightedly surprised.

And if the TTI hadn't been enough proof of the plan having succeeded, then the one-sided conversation currently taking place on the other side of the machine certainly was. Peering around the machine discreetly, Perry could see he was not alone in the room- Doofenshmirtz, his back turned to the machine and his tone prideful, was currently striding around the room, talking excitedly of his newest plan. And most bizarrely, he was talking to Perry himself, who was still trapped in the ridiculous grandfather clock that Doofenshmirtz had used for a cage. The agent listened patiently, but there was a strong undertone of disappointment in his otherwise stony features. The reason, though it had slipped Doofenshmirtz's mind, was quite clear- today was their Neme-Versary, and the evil scientist had apparently forgotten entirely. Hiding behind the Time Transporter-Inator, Perry winced, remembering how much the realization had hurt. But Doofenshmirtz wasn't the most observant human Perry had met, and he was too occupied with his new machine to try to figure his nemesis out.

"…If it works without blowing anything up, then it's safe to use," he was saying, voice filled with devilish anticipation. "And if it goes horribly wrong, then I'll just use it on you instead!"

Then he turned on his heel and came straight for the machine, all set to test it, Perry supposed. The platypus ducked behind it and hid, remembering what Phineas and Ferb had said about not being seen. Doofenshmirtz, thankfully, didn't notice a thing and began to fiddle with the controls on his machine.

Hidden from view behind the Inator, Perry cleared his mind and tried to remember what Phineas and Ferb had told him about this mission. They had planned to show up, quietly prevent Perry of the past from getting stuck in the TTI, and go home again. That was all, wasn't it?

No, he had forgotten something- some little detail that would have proved troublesome. What had it been…?

But his thoughts were suddenly interrupted by an unexpected flash of bright light and a strange popping sound, and the world went white for a moment. When next he opened his eyes, he could hear Doofenshmirtz gloating about his machine to Perry's past self, obviously pleased with his success. But then, behind him, something strange happened- he heard Doofenshmirtz again. Talking over himself.

Whirling around in bewilderment, he came face-to-leg with what appeared to be another Doofenshmirtz, albeit clad in purple flip-flops and looking a little frazzled. Perry gaped, letting that sink in. _Two _Doofenshmirtzes? What in the world-?

Oblivious to Perry's presence, the new Doofenshmirtz grinned evilly and raised his arms in a triumphant way. "Haha, it worked!" he cackled loudly. "It functioned properly!"

But a moment later, however, he put a hand over his mouth in a stunned sort of way and fell silent. The first Doofenshmirtz stopped talking for a moment, apparently confused. "Did you hear something, Perry the Platypus?" he asked, as if he expected an answer. Of course there was no reply, chatter or otherwise, from Perry. After a beat, he seemed to brush it off as nothing and continued with his monologue. "Anyway, they should be back in eight minutes or so. That's the minimum amount of time…"

The other Doofenshmirtz uncovered his mouth and giggled nervously. "Whoops, that was a close one. Now, I must carry on with my-"

However, in the middle of his sentence, he glanced down and noticed Perry staring up at him, wide-eyed and a little suspicious. He yelped loudly, then recovered himself and hissed, "_Perry the Platypus?_ What- what are you doing-" He floundered for a moment, lost for words. Then, sputtering for a good excuse for there being two of him, he added hastily, "B-but you're supposed to be trapped over there!"

Here he came to an abrupt halt, glanced quickly out from behind the Time Transporter-Inator, and came back looking even more confused. "I knew it, you _are _still trapped over there! Why are there two of _you?_" He gasped, shocked, and then said accusingly, "PRETENDY THE PRACTICE-PUS?"

Perry, absolutely baffled by this last exclamation, simply blurted, "What?" which seemed to shock Doofenshmirtz even more.

"Aaah!" he shrieked, somehow managing to keep his voice down enough not to be noticed. "You- did you just _talk? _What is _wrong _with this place?"

Perry, recovering his wits, shook his head to clear it. "Translator-Inator. It's not important," he added quickly, knowing the doctor would ask. Doofenshmirtz flinched as if the words were a threat and shrank back a little, but he continued anyway. "How did you get here? And more importantly, what are you _doing _here? You're interrupting an important mission!"

Doofenshmirtz's expression brightened a little at this. "Well, I guess I could ask you the same thing, but it's more fun to just go ahead and explain. You see, Perry the Platypus, I…am from the _future!_" He said the last part with a dramatic flare, as if he was sure it would blow Perry's mind.

Though this failed to do just what Doofenshmirtz expected it to, Perry did feel he was beginning to get a headache. "Oh, no. Not you too. This is going to be just great," he grumbled. Then he paused, puzzled. "But I just came from the future, and I saw you there! Why would you have traveled back in time as well?" He stopped himself abruptly. Temporal issues were really not his forte.

"I don't know what you're talking about, Perry the Platypus," said Doofenshmirtz, with a skeptical glance down at his nemesis. "Last I saw you, you didn't say _anything _about going back in time with me. Well, for that matter, you didn't say anything at all, which I have to say was much preferable. Hey, did you say you had a _Translator-Inator?_" His mouth widened into a sudden grin. "That's so cool! Why didn't I think of that?"

Perry shrugged slightly. "Well, technically, you did."

Doofenshmirtz looked surprised and rather in awe of himself, but Perry didn't have time or patience enough to pursue the topic. "But how can we both be from the future like this?" he muttered, irked by his lack of understanding. "Maybe…you're from an earlier time than me? No, that doesn't make any sense. With all the weird time-travel stuff going on, you would have mentioned it. And why would you want to come back here, anyway, when you've got the whole Tri-State Area at your beck and call?"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, the whole Tri-State Area?" Doofenshmirtz exclaimed, stunned. "I'm the leader of the Tri-State Area in your future? That's so awesome! How'd I do it?" He gasped suddenly, leaving Perry in the dust. "Does this mean my plan is going to work? I _knew _this was a good idea!"

"What?" Perry sputtered, feeling he was slowly losing his grip on the situation. "Why is this new to you? Are you from a different timeline or something? Argh, why does time travel have to be so confusing!" He groaned and put a hand over his eyes, as if it might help clear his head. Doofenshmirtz, in sharp contrast, looked exuberant.

"Ah, I'm glad you asked about my plan!" he said gleefully. Perry almost interjected that he hadn't, but Doofenshmirtz just grinned and launched into his monologue without hesitation.

"Well, it started like this," he began excitedly. "I was just sitting around my house watching the news, and they were doing this story about some guy who, I don't know, grew up poor and then started making movies or something. He's not important. The thing is, it made me think- 'Why does _he _get to be famous and wealthy and stuff? Why can't _I_ do something like that?' And then they started talking about one of his movies, where this guy goes back in time to change something that happened when he was a kid, and then- I don't know, he comes back and everything is great or something like that. Actually, it might have gone horribly wrong. I don't remember." He shrugged and rolled his eyes, as if to say, _It's not important, _and continued.

"Anyway, it gave me the idea to build these babies!" He stuck out a foot proudly, apparently displaying the bright purple flip-flop dangling from it. Perry gave it a suspicious glance, then raised an eyebrow. "A pair of flip-flops," he said dryly.

"Not just any pair of flip-flops," Doofenshmirtz continued. "A pair of TIME TRAVELING flip-flops! See, you can stomp your feet to input the date you want to travel to, isn't it cool? And they're portable!" And he grinned widely, obviously pleased with his invention.

Perry raised an eyebrow. "Why didn't you just rebuild this thing?" he asked skeptically, jabbing a thumb at the TTI.

"Well, I would have," Doofenshmirtz explained, "except I figured out later that it doesn't actually work like a real time machine! See, you'd never guess- it actually just transports stuff to another dimension, where time moves much slower than it does in ours, and then spits it out again after a while, perfectly preserved. So it only transports things to the future! Weird, huh?"

Perry just stared. "You never mentioned this _before…_"

"I didn't think of it before."

"I don't know. Sounds like more lazy writing to me."

Doofenshmirtz's mouth hung open blankly. "What are you-?" But after a moment, he seemed to decide that there was no point in trying to ask, and he returned to explaining his plan with a slightly deflated air.

"So after building my Time-Traveling-Flip-Flop-Inators, I decided to put them to use. So I devised an eeevil scheme…my most evil scheme yet!" he added, his countenance darkening and his grin curling a little wider. The sound of it put Perry on edge, for a reason he couldn't quite place, and it raised the fur on the back of his neck.

"My plan was simple," Doofenshmirtz drawled. "I decided to achieve ultimate domination, I would travel back in time to your weakest moment, which is approaching as we speak! Once I had the upper hand, I would get rid of your past self once and for all, and then watch as _my _past self conquers the Tri-State Area- unhindered and unrestrained!" Then he burst into a bout of evil laughter, the sound ringing through the room with a malicious edge. (It was hard to believe they hadn't been noticed yet.)

Perry stared in horror, halfway appalled by his choice of words ('get rid of your past self' had a chilling ring to it), and halfway impressed. How could that be right? Doofenshmirtz had never said anything about this during Perry's time in the future, not once. Unless…

Wait.

Phineas and Ferb had mentioned a saboteur, someone who had traveled back in time to change the past at this very moment and turn the tide in LOVE MUFFIN's favor. And Carl had mentioned that whoever it was had come from a different future than the one Perry had visited, a completely distinct timeline. Considering these facts, and the plan he had just been presented with, Perry's quick-thinking mind could produce only one solution…

_Doofenshmirtz himself was the saboteur._

His eyes widened, and he took a step back in shock. Doofenshmirtz, having noticed the little sign of alarm, ceased laughing and sneered down at Perry. "And now, Perry the Platypus," he added, a sudden undertone of maliciousness in his voice, "I'm afraid I'm just going to have to stop you from stopping me from stopping your past self from stopping my dreams of conquest from coming true!"

Perry stopped in his tracks and stared. Doofenshmirtz continued to grin dangerously for a moment, but soon faltered as the silence sank in. "I- I know. It's confusing," he assured his nemesis. "Just bear with me, okay?"

For a moment, Perry just stared. But then, in spite of the lighter remark, he began to feel a fresh wave of resolve spreading through him. Sinister plan or no, he was still dealing with Doofenshmirtz- and Doofenshmirtz was still an idiot, no matter what timeline he was from.

In the split second he had to work with, his mind went into overdrive. His mission was simple- prevent Doofenshmirtz from catching Perry's past self in the Time Transporter-Inator and turning it on. After that, somehow he'd have to get rid of Doofenshmirtz and the machine, seeing as it seemed to cause temporal problems just by existing. And in order to do that, he'd probably have to distract his past self and the other Doofenshmirtz. But how to do this?

Hm. Plans. They generally took longer than the time Perry had.

He decided to improvise.

Leaping into sudden action, he dashed forward and swept Doofenshmirtz's feet, knocking him away from the Time Transporter-Inator's controls. Doofenshmirtz shrieked as he fell, in a tone that was more indignant than alarmed, but the past Perry and Doofenshmirtz were too busy fighting to notice.

Watching the two of them go at it, Perry noted the flip out of the way his past self had executed, the punch Doofenshmirtz was about to throw…this was it. He glanced down at the control pad, ready to find the correct button as fast as possible- and then realized that Doofenshmirtz had labeled them all. Oh. Well, that made it simpler.

Just as the past Doofenshmirtz made an accidental swipe at Perry, sending him flying towards the machine, he pressed the button labeled 'DOORS'- and rather than falling into the machine, the doors closed, and the agent crashed into them instead. It still sounded rather painful, but at the very least he hadn't been caught. He stumbled for a moment, looking winded, but quickly recovered and leapt once more at Doofenshmirtz. And the battle resumed in full force, as if nothing had happened. Neither of the opponents knew of the bullet they'd just dodged.

Hidden safely behind the TTI, Perry breathed a sigh of relief. Stage one was complete. Now there was just the other Doofenshmirtz to deal with- and more importantly, his troublemaker of a creation.

"Perry the Platypus!" Doofenshmirtz growled from the floor, as if on cue. "I can't _believe _you would do that! Well, actually, I guess I can- but now I'm going to have to find some other moment to strike, and it's all thanks to you!"

Perry just frowned down at him. His mission wasn't over yet. "Good luck with that." And without further ado, he picked up a nearby rope (probably left out for trapping purposes) and adroitly tied his nemesis up. Doofenshmirtz yelped and began to struggle, but Perry merely tightened the bonds to assure himself of their security.

"Sorry, Doof," he said, with an actual note of apology in his voice. "It's part of the job."

Still, looking at him now, Perry couldn't help but feel a little guilty- his mind was still full of the recent events he had been through in the future, and of the time he and his nemesis had spent together, and the way Doofenshmirtz had bade him goodbye. It felt bad to treat the man this way when part of him still just wanted to say 'thank you'. Especially now that he knew the future was probably going to disappear, and the two of them along with it…

He furrowed his brow determinedly. No matter what temporal insanity awaited him after this, or how he felt about his enemy, it was safer to keep him restrained. He decided to turn back to the problem at hand.

The Time Transporter-Inator was one of Doofenshmirtz's inventions, so it had to have a self-destruct, he assumed. However, upon closer inspection of the control pad, it appeared there was none- despite the buttons being so meticulously labeled. Perry felt his heart skip a beat in alarm. The hulking thing looked too sturdy to destroy with brute force, and too heavy and noticeable to steal. He needed something that would get rid of the device, and (preferably) leave him time to get out.

Then another detail came to mind. On his first day in the future, at Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated, the machine had self-destructed after being used twice. He remembered it because of how angry he had been with Doofenshmirtz- its own creator!- for forgetting to mention this. And then, even more irritating, the man had actually rescued him when he was falling out of the building at breakneck speed. But that part wasn't important.

The important part was the conveniently short lifespan of the Time Transport-Inator. Seeing as Doofenshmirtz had already tested it once, the second usage should activate the self-destruct and get rid of the machine!

But there was his past self to consider. Glancing out from behind the machine, he saw with little surprise that the other him and Doofenshmirtz were still fighting. It seemed they weren't going to stop until either Perry or the machine was destroyed (and again, this didn't phase him at all). But no matter how involved in the fray they were, Perry had been told he had a keen eye, and even Doofenshmirtz was bound to notice if the doors of the machine started opening and closing on their own. He needed a distraction.

And then, a very lucky thing happened; out of the corner of his eye, he happened to notice a small, plastic package laying near the Time Transport-Inator. Reaching out to it, he instantly recognized the small, spongy object wrapped inside as well as the label, _Cuppy-Cake Pastries. _It must have been knocked out of his fedora when his past self hit the doors of the machine- though it seemed odd now, as he hadn't even thought about the thing since the day the whole mess started.

Behind him, the other Doofenshmirtz made a sound of disgust. "Ugh, is that a Cuppy-Cake? Ooooh, I hate those things!" He shuddered a bit to emphasize his point. "What are you going to do with that, anyway? I know it destroys good eating habits, but it's not going to destroy my Inator!"

Perry raised his eyebrows and glanced out at his past self. A plan began to form in his mind- a crazy plan, with plenty of things that could go wrong, but a viable plan nonetheless.

"Actually, Doof…you'd be surprised," he muttered, a small grin tugging at his bill.

Meanwhile in the center of the room, the past Doofenshmirtz and Perry continued to duke it out. One of the doctor's cheeks was beginning to turn red with an odd waffle pattern that had probably come from Perry's tail, and the agent's hat was sitting a little askew from an apparent strike gone wrong. Both of them looked a little frazzled, though Doofenshmirtz was obviously the worse for wear.

However, as if they didn't have enough bruises already, there was one more yet to come, and come it did- sweet, speedy, and headed straight for Doofenshmirtz's head.

_Thunk! _The unidentified flying cupcake collided with Doofenshmirtz's right temple, knocking him off balance and then falling with a little _squeak _to the floor. He yelped and stumbled a few steps backwards, then threw an accusatory glare down at the guilty item.

"What the-? That's called fighting _dirty, _Perry the Platypus! No one said you could throw things at-" he stopped, gasped slowly, and then added, even more incensed, "Ooh, and of all things! You _know _I hate these!"

He picked up the cupcake and shook it emphatically at his opponent, who simply stared in total bewilderment. Behind the Inator, Perry crossed his fingers.

"Seriously, look at this- vanilla flavor and everything! Those are always so… so bland…" Doofenshmirtz slowed down halfway through his sentence, squinting at the packaging. Gradually, his expression began to change from disgust…to enlightenment.

"Ohhhh, that's it!" he exclaimed suddenly, apparently delighted. An excited smile replaced the grimace he had previously worn, and he executed an odd little hop for joy. "That's it, Perry the Platypus! The thing- the thing that I forgot- oh, how could I forget what today was? Of course, that's why I was building something big, to celebrate! I can't believe I forgot- oh, and you even got me a little prank gift!"

A few feet away, Perry's face brightened (you could tell he was just thrilled to hear that) and he nodded happily.

"Aw, that's so sweet of you," Doofenshmirtz added, having read the note Perry had scribbled on the plastic package. "Nice handwriting, by the way. Ooh! And before I forget again, I have a card for you! Look, it's over here, you'll love it…"

And the two of them retreated to the other end of the room, where Doofenshmirtz began to rifle through some drawers in search of the card.

Seeing his chance, Perry darted around the Time Transporter-Inator to the control pad and pressed a button. The machine's doors opened with a metallic sliding sound, but luckily, the other Doofenshmirtz and Perry didn't notice a thing (they were too engulfed with the card Doofenshmirtz was now displaying proudly). Feeling emboldened, Perry rushed back behind the machine, where the other Doofenshmirtz was still sitting, tied up and looking rather hassled.

"What are you doing?" he asked. "Is this some kind of plan to get rid of my Inator? It _is, _isn't it? Oh, come on, Perry the Platypus, this isn't fair-!"

"Sssshhh!" Perry interrupted, holding a finger to his lips with a stern frown. "Do you want to get us noticed and mess up the space-time continuum?"

Doofenshmirtz paused and looked away thoughtfully, as if considering whether such an act could be considered evil. Perry, mindful of the very short time limit he'd bought himself, took advantage of the momentary silence and grabbed his nemesis by the feet. He then proceeded to drag him around the TTI, headed for the open doors.

"Hey, hey, hey, what are you doing _now?_" Doofenshmirtz whispered, having apparently decided that the space-time continuum should be left alone for the time being. "Are we getting inside the machine? Why would you do that, it could activate and-!"

"Doofenshmirtz, shut up!" Perry hissed.

"Or what, you'll throw me in and send me to the ice age?" said Doofenshmirtz sneeringly.

Perry, halfway through shoving him through the doors, turned and gave him a scathing look. "I thought it only worked one-way."

Doofenshmirtz stared blankly for a moment, defeated by his own logic, and shut up.

Without hesitation, Perry painstakingly hauled him into the machine, lab coat and all. He glanced around at the other him, who thankfully was too caught up with his own nemesis to notice a thing. Putting a hand on the door, Perry reached for the control pad and pressed a button. Then he slipped inside as the doors slid shut with a little _hiss, _for what he sincerely hoped would be the last time, and the machine began to hum darkly.

Out of nowhere, he felt a chill run down his spine, and a cloud of doubt suddenly overtook his conscience. If he had just changed the future, and that was where the Time Transporter-Inator would take them, then where would they end up? In the timeline he had come from, or from Doofenshmirtz's, or in a new one? Or maybe they would just stop existing halfway through? He suddenly wished he knew more about time travel.

And what of his timeline? Would everyone there disappear as well? And Phineas and Ferb…would they disappear with the horrible thought that he was gone? It all felt so incomplete. He still had to tell the boys that he was okay, that everything was going to be okay. And he wanted to see Candace, to apologize for hiding the truth from her. He wanted to see them all reunited with their parents. He wanted to make this future- their present- worth all their hard work.

And strangely, despite everything that had happened during his time in the future…he wanted to see Doofenshmirtz again. It wasn't just that the doctor had saved his life, and was clearly owed a 'thank you'- it was because of the deep, lonely ache that he'd felt when he saw his past self exchanging cards with his nemesis. They'd been so happy, he realized, in their own weird nemesis-y way. And now, in spite of all the times Doofenshmirtz had gotten on his nerves or messed something up, accidentally gotten them in trouble or put his foot in his mouth, tried to destroy him or even just made him feel bad…now he just wanted to see him again, and to make up for all the time they'd lost.

Because looking at his past self now, he realized that he wasn't needed here anymore. The past was just that, the past, and now he had to turn his sights toward the future- Danville's future, his family's future, and his own.

Now there was a Tri-State Area that was one platypus short, and that was where he needed to stay.

Suddenly, the machine gave a small jolt, and the moment came rushing back to him. The entire chamber was now shaking dangerously with a low rumbling noise, and the floor had lit up like a spotlight. The sound was slowly growing louder, and the quaking greater, and in the middle of it all, Perry was hit with a single, unsettling thought.

"…I just remembered how nauseating this was last time."

Doofenshmirtz, glaring at the platypus perched uncomfortably on his knees, groaned in dread over the growing noise. "I hate you, you know that?"

Perry sighed, gave him a somewhat apologetic glance, and said, "I know."

And then, in a sickening, ear-popping instant, the universe ceased to exist.

* * *

><p>"…And the glitter was on sale, too, which makes it even better! See, I knew you'd like it. I put a lot of thought into this thing."<p>

Perry couldn't believe his luck.

In a single conceivably concussion-causing cupcake collision, Doofenshmirtz had gone from totally clueless to totally celebratory, and things had gone swimmingly since. Even the Cuppy-Cake thing had gone over well, and he'd had a bit of indecision about whether that joke would be in good taste. Well, not in good _taste, _clearly, as Cuppy-Cakes tasted vaguely of cardboard and sugar, but all the same.

He had to admit, when no one else had remembered the occasion (well, 'no one else' was just Major Monogram, but still), he'd started to wonder whether he'd gotten it mixed up himself- but now that Doofenshmirtz remembered, none of that seemed to matter. Now, he thought, he was going to have a nice afternoon with his frenemy, and then maybe go home and take a good long nap.

But first, fate had a last twist planned.

Just as the two of them were finishing with the cards, there was an odd little _click _from the far side of the room and a low humming, and upon turning to investigate, they were immediately confronted with the sight of the Time Transporter-Inator activating, apparently, of its own accord. The lights were flashing wildly, the whole construct was trembling as if it would explode, and it was emitting an alarming growl that was hard to ignore. And then, before either one of them could react properly (beyond covering their ears), a blinding light filled every crevice of the room. Doofenshmirtz shrieked loudly, but by now the noise was so loud you'd never hear him, and Perry pulled his hat down over his ears and squinted his eyes shut. Then, in a heartbeat, the whole thing disappeared- leaving only a dying whirr that slowly faded away, and soon ground to a halt altogether.

Silence reigned.

At length, Doofenshmirtz blinked, to clear the sun spots out of his eyes. He was quiet for a moment, as if puzzling over what had just happened.

Then he turned on Perry with a small gasp. "Perry the Platypus, _you _did that somehow, didn't you?" he accused angrily, pointing a finger at his startled nemesis. Perry blinked and put his hands up to plead his innocence.

"Oh, you can't fool me," said Doofenshmirtz doggedly. "You probably even knew that it tends to blow up after two uses, didn't you?"

And as if on cue, the machine promptly exploded, spraying debris and smoke everywhere and blasting Doofenshmirtz's already wild hair straight back.

Flabbergasted and exasperated, Doofenshmirtz gesticulated speechlessly for a moment. Then, lost for words, he simply shook his fist and yelled, "CURSE YOU, PERRY THE PLATYPUS!"

Perry frowned uncomfortably, hoping this wasn't going to ruin their day. Yes, he'd been planning to destroy the Time Transporter-Inator after they were done celebrating their Neme-Versary- but he hadn't done a thing to it yet. So if he hadn't turned it on, and Doofenshmirtz hadn't either, then who…?

Doofenshmirtz put his fist down and gave a small sigh. "Oh well, I guess I didn't expect it to make it to the end of the day anyhow. Let's see, it's still pretty early…I guess I could always come up with a different scheme to pass the time or something…" Then he snapped his fingers and grinned. "Ooh, I've got it! I've got a few episodes of my favorite soap opera recorded (you remember _El Matador de Amor, _right?) and I was just thinking how I'd really like to catch up with Juan and Esmerelda's _adorable _love story. You wanna, like, 'hang out' and watch some with me?" He made quotation marks with his fingers as he spoke and cracked a goofy grin.

Perry, although still confused by the machine's sudden activation, could not help but think this a lovely suggestion. He smiled happily and gave the thumbs up.

"Great, it's in here!" said Doofenshmirtz cheerily, striding off to the living room and beckoning for his nemesis to follow. As Perry padded after him, he reflected that there had been a strange reversal; for once, it appeared Doofenshmirtz had saved the day. But, despite the nice afternoon he was sure he was going to have, he still couldn't help but wonder what had happened to the Time Transporter-Inator…

* * *

><p>Candace had never been happier to see what Phineas and Ferb were up to- or, on the other hand, to discover that whatever it had been was over.<p>

For about ten minutes now, she'd been standing and listening patiently as Isabella, Baljeet, and Buford eagerly related the events of their rescue mission to her and Jeremy. She'd gasped when they broke in through the roof, held her breath as they told her about the ensuing battle, gasped again as they explained how Perry had seemingly been destroyed, and been very relieved when they told her about how Doofenshmirtz switched the power cores. Granted, the main thing that puzzled her about the whole thing was why it had taken her so long to get up the stairs when she had once gone up and down in under five minutes, but she supposed that wasn't important. (It was an awfully long flight of stairs, after all.)

"And then, Rodney backed him up against the wall holding the Triple-T," Isabella was in the middle of explaining, "when all of a sudden, Doofenshmirtz did something to it and-"

"BOOM!" Buford added helpfully, throwing his arms in the air for effect and thwacking Baljeet in the ear in the process. Baljeet yelped and gave the bully a reproving glare.

"So it's gone?" asked Candace, raising her eyebrows. "The thing they built, I mean?"

"Sure is," Isabella confirmed.

Candace pounded her fist into her other hand, grinning. "I knew it! The mysterious force is back, and it recognizes my adult superiority! And to think, all I had to do was lead an army into battle and win." And she shrugged, as if to say, _I should have tried this ages ago._

Meanwhile, the LOVE MUFFIN officials and guards had been rounded up, and were now being led back down the steps single file- all except for Professor Periwinkle, whom Doofenshmirtz had excused on account of his being 'not so evil after all'.

"Whai, tank you, Doofy!" the professor had squeaked. Then he'd added confusedly, "…I tink?"

Rodney was still knocked out, and had to be brought away on a stretcher, while his comrades had their pockets searched and their hands tied behind their backs. However, in sharp contrast with the grumbling, glaring, generally resentful LOVE MUFIN professors, Phineas and Ferb, who were overseeing the proceedings, looked delighted (albeit rather tired).

"Well, Ferb, that should be the last of 'em!" said Phineas cheerfully, wiping a bead of sweat off his brow. Ferb nodded and breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

"So, does that mean we've won?" Candace asked, having come over to investigate. "LOVE MUFFIN is finally vanquished for all time or whatever?"

"It sure does!" Phineas answered with a grin. Then a brief shadow of sadness passed over his countenance. "I just wish we'd done it sooner, you know? All those years of oppression could have been avoided, if we'd been willing to take the risk…"

"Oh, it's not your fault," Candace assured her brother, putting a hand on his shoulder comfortingly.

"And it's over now, anyway," Jeremy added with a smile. "Don't dwell on it."

Phineas nodded, but the frown remained. "I wonder how Perry's mission is going," he thought aloud, seeming concerned. "What if…he doesn't succeed?"

"Pardon me for cutting in," said Doofenshmirtz, who had finished chatting with Professor Periwinkle and apparently overheard their conversation, "but this is _Perry the Platypus_ we're talking about." And he nodded knowingly, like that said it all.

Candace just nodded slowly with a doubtful frown. She just couldn't picture her pet platypus carrying out this supposedly very dangerous mission that Phineas and Ferb had described to her. Somehow, no matter how much the boys praised their pet, the thought of him fighting the saboteur they'd spoken of with his little webbed feet and his funny-shaped bill just seemed absurd.

"All the same," Phineas continued in a worried tone. "There are a lot of little details that could have gone over better. Like, what happens after the mission is done? Ferb and I had planned to bring the Triple-T with us so we could open another portal and go home, just to make sure we wouldn't cause any temporal errors- but Perry doesn't have any way of getting back! What's going to happen to him?"

Candace cocked an eyebrow. "Well, why can't he just use that thing that brought him here? You know, the other time-thingy. The…um…"

"The Time Transporter-Inator?" Doofenshmirtz put in helpfully.

"Yeah, that!"

"That's a fair point," said Isabella, smiling in a reassuring way. "You sent him back to a time when it still existed, right?"

"That's right!" said Phineas, a hopeful smile spreading across his face. Then it faltered, and he added sadly, "but for that to work, the machine would have to still exist in our time, too…"

He glanced at Doofenshmirtz, who shrugged doubtfully with an uncomfortable expression. "I could rebuild it," he suggested, seeming none too enthusiastic about the prospect. The last time he had rebuilt the Time Transporter-Inator, it had wound up destroying the top floor of his building, attracting a horde of minions who were all intent on arresting his very jet-lagged nemesis, and landing him in deep trouble with LOVE MUFFIN (or so he had thought). And more importantly, he had no idea where the blueprints were.

"Oh, tere's no need for dat, Doofy!" came an unexpected squeaky voice.

Surprised and confused, everyone turned to face Professor Periwinkle, who seemed rather excited about something and was rocking back and forth slightly in anticipation.

"You shee," the professor explained, his odd voice trembling a bit, "rechently, me and shum of da gaiz were trying to tink of a nais way to rewahd you for all da evil tings you do, Doofy (and to pay you back for hosting dat Minion Apprechiation Day shindig, it was wandarful)- and I taught to maiself, 'what yoosh ish a big old pile of junk jusht sitting around being big and old and uselesh?' So we taught we'd rebuild some of your old machines for you, as a little shurpraish!"

Doofenshmirtz raised his eyebrows and glanced at the others, who looked hopeful and eager. He turned back to Periwinkle with a small smile. "You mean, it's-?"

But just then, he was interrupted by Ferb, who had raised a finger to his lips and was now shushing them all fervently. There was a tense moment of silence, during which everyone else listened too. And then they heard it.

_Beep._

_Beep._

_Beep, beep, beep, beep…_

_Whirrrrrrrrrrr…_

The silence was suddenly broken as Baljeet squeaked in excitement, and Professor Periwinkle uttered a small, "Ooh!" Then Doofenshmirtz, wide-eyed and looking rather alarmed, shouted, "The lab!"

And they all took off, headed for the aforementioned room with flying feet and bated breath.

Upon arriving at the source of the noise and flinging the door open, they were immediately greeted with a blinking, blinding light that had suddenly flashed from within the room. Everyone yelled and covered their eyes, but the light cleared quite soon- and then, with only a low growl of machinery remaining, it was over.

Slowly, the boys uncovered their eyes, squinting as best they could at the newly-rebuilt machine (which, oddly, was now painted pink with purple polka-dots; a modification thanks to Professor Periwinkle, one had to guess). Phineas' mouth hung open slightly in awe and excitement, while Ferb simply raised his eyebrows. Everyone else followed suit in one way or another.

A bit of smoke curled away from the machine's doors, just as if they were tempting someone to open them and reveal the chamber's contents. Doofenshmirtz bit his lip, an odd mix of anxiety and hope swelling in his chest. He turned to Periwinkle uncertainly.

"Should I, ah…" he pointed hesitantly at the TTI. Periwinkle waved it aside.

"Oh, Doofy, so old-fashioned," he said lightly, with a little smile. "No, we made the doows automatic! Dere's no need to get tem youwself- oh! Dere dey go now."

Sure enough, as he spoke, there was a little_ click _from the machine and the doors glided open smoothly. As if by silent agreement, no one moved- except for Phineas, Ferb, and Doofenshmirtz, who all approached the machine with a cautious step. They paused just outside, and Phineas and Doofenshmirtz gasped quietly.

"Perry!" exclaimed all three of them in unison, a thrilled grin spreading across Phineas' face and a relieved smile stretching across the doctor's.

"He made it back!" Phineas exclaimed.

"And he's still got that translator," Ferb added.

"And he brought a little, uh…friend," said Doofenshmirtz haltingly, knitting his brows. Then, pointing uncertainly, he said, "Is that _me?_"

For there, lying unconscious in the bottom of the machine, were Perry and- yes- another Doofenshmirtz, both unconscious and looking rather cramped. The doctor was halfway curled against the back wall of the machine with his knees drawn up and his arms raised as if to cover his head (although this was an unfortunate impossibility due to their being tied together), and Perry was laying on his side in the leftover space. Both of them looked a little hassled- Doofenshmirtz's hands and feet were bound efficiently, and Perry's Translator-Inator was just barely hanging on to the brim of his hat.

Looking at the two of them, Doofenshmirtz raised an eyebrow and said simply, "Well. This is…unexpected."

Phineas, on the other hand, had suddenly become concerned. "Is he okay?" he asked, lifting his pet out gently. "Why's he asleep like this? Has something happened to him?"

"Oh, that's normal. It's just really disorienting in there," Doofenshmirtz assured him, as Ferb put a finger to Perry's neck to look for a pulse. Just as he did so, Perry stirred slightly, and a quiet growl escaped his throat.

"He's waking up!" exclaimed Phineas triumphantly, turning to face his waiting companions with an enthused grin. Obviously relieved to hear the news, they gave a shout and ran over to see for themselves.

As the boys and their friends attended to their groggy pet, Doofenshmirtz gave his other self a suspicious, squint-eyed look. "…Is that really what I look like when I'm asleep?"

But whether or not this was true, he would never know- for at that moment Perry began to awaken.

* * *

><p>"<em>Perry…? Perry…"<em>

"_Wake up, Perry…!"_

"_Perry the Platypus, are you okay?…"_

Perry came to with an odd feeling of static in his ears, along with the strange notion that he'd had it before. It did feel rather familiar, this drowsy sort of waking-up feeling. He supposed he'd felt like this at least twice before in the past few days, and he hoped vaguely that this would be the last time he had to endure it.

His mouth felt dry, his body was tired, his eyes didn't seem to want to open, and his mind felt a bit jumbled as well. It took him a moment to remember why this was so, but then-

"Perry!"

-it was all rushing back to him-

"_Wake up, Perry, you can do it…"_

-the mission- the Time Transporter-Inator-

"_Poor thing, he looks so tired…!"_

-Phineas and Ferb-

"_It's okay, boy, come on…"_

-Doofenshmirtz-

"_Perry the Platypus? Please wake up…"_

-he had to wake up-!

His eyes snapped open and he jerked a bit as if he'd just awoken from a dream of falling. Several exclamations sounded around him, and he was suddenly aware of being held in someone's arms. Upon prying his eyes open once more and glancing around, he was immediately greeted with a group of familiar, very welcome faces- Candace, Isabella, Baljeet, and Buford were just in front of him, all wearing large grins and looking very glad to see him. They all began to chatter at once, welcoming him back, asking if he was okay, and wondering how his mission had gone. But his voice didn't feel quite up to being used yet- and besides, he had to know, where were Phineas and Ferb?

"Oh, Perry, we're so happy to see you!"

A small gasp escaping him, he glanced upwards, and there they were- Ferb was holding him and smiling brightly, and Phineas was at his brother's right shoulder, holding Perry's little hand very tightly in his own with a delighted appearance.

His voice cracked a bit. "Phineas, Ferb…!" And then they were all hugging, each just glad to be with the other again. Candace joined in too, putting her arms around her little brothers lovingly with a contented smile. As this went on, the others' shouts of joy and excitement continued around them; but Perry only had ears for his beloved family.

"Good to have ya back, meat brick!" came Candace's cheerfully joking voice.

"Candace!" Perry said in surprise. "It's good to _be _back…!"

"I trust the mission went well," said Ferb, somehow managing to sound congratulatory, loving, and even a tad excited all at once. Ferb had that kind of quiet brilliance that gave his words just the tone and meaning he meant for them, and it was never more wonderful to hear.

"It did, it really did," he replied happily, nuzzling the teenager's cheek with a wide smile.

"We thought we lost you, boy!" Phineas sounded incredibly happy, but also a little choked. Perry supposed he'd had a rather dramatic day. They all had.

"No, I'm okay." He felt he had to assure them of this. "I'm fine…are you two alright? You're not hurt?"

"No, no, we're okay…everything's okay…"

With little surprise, he found himself purring quietly. So it was over? Had they won? Whatever had happened to LOVE MUFFIN? Countless questions were presenting themselves to him, and despite the lovely reunion they were having, he felt he had to get started soon or he would burst.

He pulled away a bit and looked the boys in the eyes. There were so many things he had to ask, it was hard to decide what to pick- but almost without thinking about it, the first thing he said was; "Where's Doofenshmirtz?"

Behind him, there was a small noise as from someone clearing their throat. "Um, back here."

Perry turned sharply, a little smile playing across his bill, and there he was- looking absolutely disheveled and grinning sheepishly, sitting behind his nemesis with his hands awkwardly twisting in his lap. The doctor gave a little wave with one hand, while the other played with the edge of his lab coat nervously. Perry, after a short pause, gave a little grin.

"You are _my_ Doof, right?" he asked playfully with a small laugh. "The one from this timeline, I mean? Because I have seen way too many different incarnations of you today, and it's starting to get to me."

This sparked a little bout of laughter from everyone, even Doofenshmirtz, which was partly due to Perry's remark and partly due to their sheer relief at having him back.

"I am so glad to see you all again," said Perry happily when they had all calmed down. "But what happened? How did the Time Transporter-Inator get rebuilt? Did you defeat LOVE MUFFIN?"

"Yeah, we won!" Phineas said excitedly. "At first, we thought you'd really been destroyed, but then Rodney found out that Dr. D had switched the power cores- and then he tried to get him with the Triple-T since it had the Disintevaporator-Inizer's power core in it, but it blew up instead of working- and then, Candace showed up with the rest of the troops, and we took everybody into custody!"

"Except for me, 'cause I helped," said Doofenshmirtz proudly, drawing himself up with a little smirk.

"Speaking of that," Candace said suspiciously, narrowing her eyes at Doofenshmirtz (who shifted uncomfortably) and Professor Periwinkle (who had simply been standing by the wall and watching pleasantly while all this happened), "are we really going to let them go? What if they try something again?"

Phineas shrugged in a sort of calm way that showed he wasn't worried. "Well, I'd say we're pretty safe so long as we've got the rest of LOVE MUFFIN locked up. And if Dr. D tries something…" He glanced at Perry with a glowing smile. "Well, I think our 'Agent P' has got it covered!"

Perry smiled warmly, glad to hear that the boys had such faith in him- and that they weren't worried for him anymore.

Candace didn't look entirely convinced. "What about him?" she asked, jabbing a thumb at Periwinkle, who waved amiably.

"Oh, he's not going to be any trouble," Doofenshmirtz assured her with a little flip of the hand.

Periwinkle gave an exclamation of agreement, then went on to say something absolutely bewildering, presumably about how he wouldn't be a problem, gesticulating as he spoke and smiling brightly all the time.

There was a short silence. Doofenshmirtz, after a moment, turned and said, "See?"

Candace nodded slowly, one eye still narrowed in confusion, and the others turned to each other with puzzled expressions, wondering if anyone else had understood. Perry leaned over to Doofenshmirtz and muttered, "What's he saying?"

"I have no idea," Doofenshmirtz replied out of the corner of his mouth.

Perry couldn't help but laugh.

Phineas cleared his throat. "Um, anyway," he started awkwardly. "Perry, we've told you what happened here- but what happened to you? Did you make it to the past? Did your mission succeed?"

Perry nodded smilingly. "Yes, and yes," he confirmed. He then proceeded to tell them of all the things that had happened, from his arriving in the past to his leaving it. Everyone was amazed by the story, but naturally, Doofenshmirtz found it the most interesting. By the end of it, he was bursting with questions.

"So, this is me…but from another timeline?" he asked, nudging his doppelganger experimentally with the toe of his shoe. "Why's he all tied up like that? Did you have something to do with this?" He glared at Perry in exasperation.

Perry shrugged with an uncomfortable frown. "He was making so much noise, and I just knew it was going to get us caught. Besides," he added, getting a sneaky smirk, "you tie me up all the time. You even made me tie _myself_ up once!"

Doofenshmirtz seemed a bit taken aback at first, but he quickly acquiesced with a nod. "Hm. True." Then he glanced down at the other Doofenshmirtz's feet, still adorned with the ridiculous flip-flops. "And what did you say these things were- time traveling flip-flops? That's so cool!"

"Well, yeah, but I'm a bit doubtful of how well they actually work," said Perry dubiously, putting a hand to his chin in thought. "I mean, they're supposed to be activated by stomping, and he was walking around an awful lot. It wouldn't surprise me if they just went off out of the blue-"

But just as he spoke, Doofenshmirtz tried to pull one of the shoes off, and in an instant it had let out a quick flash of purple light and disappeared- along with the wearer. Everybody jumped and Professor Periwinkle put his hand over his heart with a little, "Oh!" And then it was over. They all stared for a moment, before glancing at Doofenshmirtz with accusatory frowns.

Doofenshmirtz, suddenly in the spotlight, frowned uncomfortably and put his hands up in surrender. "W-well, I was thinking of taking a vacation anyway," he said hastily. Then, rubbing his neck awkwardly, he added, "A…a really _exotic _vacation."

Phineas and Ferb exchanged a somewhat worried glance, and Baljeet raised his eyebrows skeptically, but Perry couldn't help but giggle surreptitiously. Classic Doof.

"Hey, I just thought of something," Isabella spoke up unexpectedly. They turned to look at her, and she frowned. "If Perry's mission in the past succeeded…that means we're all going to disappear, doesn't it?"

They were quiet for a moment. Perry felt himself relax slightly, as he was quietly reminded of this inevitability. He exhaled softly, glanced up at Phineas and Ferb, and saw the same sentiments reflected in their tired faces. Phineas seemed to have become more somber now, more mature somehow than he was before. He looked down at his feet, then up at his brother, who put a hand on his shoulder with a gentle nod. Phineas' face tightened minutely, and he seemed to steel himself.

**(It's time for some music! Go look up 'Midna's Sacrifice- the Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess')**

"…I think so," he concluded remorsefully, returning his gaze to Isabella. Her face fell slightly, although she seemed to have already come to this conclusion herself, and behind her, the others seemed disappointed as well. Phineas sighed. "We…we had a good run, guys. It's been great knowing all of you."

Isabella's gaze was downcast. Buford seemed to be tearing up a little, and Baljeet had to comfort him tentatively with a pat on the back. Jeremy put his arms around Candace, who laid her head on his shoulder in a tender gesture. In the background, Professor Periwinkle burst into tears and produced a lime green handkerchief with which to dab at his eyes.

Phineas and Ferb were not without emotion, either. As if on cue, they turned to each other. Ferb said nothing. Phineas just stared for a moment, eyes shining softly. Then, they put their arms around each other in a good-natured brotherly embrace, and Phineas murmured, "Love you, bro."

Ferb patted him comfortingly. "Love you too, Phin."

Perry, observing this, felt a sudden sense of sadness overtaking him as well. Not wanting to disturb the boys yet, he looked up at Doofenshmirtz, expecting a last gruff sort of goodbye. However, instead of returning the sad gaze, Doofenshmirtz was busy glaring out into the middle distance, one hand on his chin. His eyes were narrowed, either in deep thought or in anger (or, possibly, a combination), and he had a rather indignant air about him. Perry raised an eyebrow.

"…Doof? Everything okay?"

Doofenshmirtz's face contracted briefly in a grimace. He suddenly burst out, "Okay, does anybody else think this is totally unfair?"

A short silence. Buford sniffed loudly.

Doofenshmirtz crossed his arms. "No, seriously. I know we're busy being all sad and stuff, but come on. We're all just going to die? The end? What's the use in that?"

"Well, it was supposed to be sort of a sad story," Ferb pointed out.

"Fourth wall, bro."

"Sorry."

"And it doesn't make any sense, either!" Doofenshmirtz continued vehemently, ignoring Ferb's odd comment. "I mean, why do we have to disappear? The other me, the one from the good future, he still got to exist and he wasn't even in his own timeline anymore! Why should we be any different?"

Phineas blinked, this being a new thought to him. "Well…to be honest, Ferb and I spent more time studying how to change the past than we did studying what would happen if we did. I guess…we just figured that would happen?"

"But we have done so much research on time travel!" Baljeet spoke up. "Have we not already come to a conclusion on this point?"

"Well, I've learned a thing or two about time travel myself," Doofenshmirtz continued, suddenly adopting a scientific tone. "And _I _learned that whenever someone makes a decision, the timeline splits into two alternate realities. Neither one of them has to stop existing- they just continue on separately, subject to the changes of their individual choices."

Ferb raised his eyebrows. Candace, wide-eyed and wondering, glanced up at Jeremy, who returned the glance with a little shrug. Perry narrowed his eyes.

"You got that off a science program or something, didn't you?" he asked skeptically. Doofenshmirtz, apparently struck by Perry's insight, squirmed uncomfortably.

"How'd you guess?" he muttered ruefully.

Perry shrugged with a faint smile. "I've never heard you say something so technical unless you heard it somewhere else."

"Still, he's got a point," Phineas spoke up, reflecting on the theories he and Ferb had come up with several days ago at the Rebellion camp. "Ferb and I thought we might be stuck in some kind of loop, or that the future would change completely if our mission succeeded- but the timeline theory seems plausible too!"

He glanced back at Baljeet, who shrugged and said, "He is right."

"So, we're not going to disappear?" asked Isabella hesitantly.

Baljeet spoke up once more. "Well, there is no way of knowing for _sure…_"

"But if you think about it," Ferb put in, raising a finger with a wise nod, "life in general has always been an uncertain matter."

"Ferb has a point too!" said Phineas, his face brightening with the light of a new day. Everyone looked up, recognizing that ever-familiar note of hope in his voice. "We might disappear any second," Phineas began, "but then again, we might not. So, as long as we're here, why shouldn't we make the most of it?"

Isabella nodded, a smile breaking over her face. "We could rebuild Danville!"

"And elect a new government!" Baljeet added hopefully.

"And I can finally show Mom all the stuff you guys did!" Candace exclaimed.

"We'll fix up the city, reunite our families, go back to our normal lives," Phineas rattled off, his voice growing brighter and brighter. "After all, if they did it in the second dimension, why can't we do it here?"

"YEAH!" everyone agreed, despite the fact that none of them had a clue what he was talking about.

"Let's go, you guys!" Phineas shouted exuberantly, raising a fist in the air. "I know what we're going to do today!"

Everyone cheered, and with the boys leading the way triumphantly, they began to head for the door, excited to get started.

"I cannot wait to get back to school…"

"I've got to tell my troop! This'll be great…!"

"I'm gonna go lift some heavy stuff!"

"Where's my cell phone? I can't _wait _to call Mom…"

And the party exited the lab cheerfully, all of them thrilled to be going back to normal. Perry grinned happily and began to follow, but stopped short. He glanced over his shoulder, and saw Doofenshmirtz standing by the Time Transporter-Inator with his back to them. Looking back, he saw Phineas and Ferb waiting by the door.

Phineas smiled invitingly. "Coming, boy?"

Perry was quiet for a moment. He looked at Doofenshmirtz, then back at the boys. Seeing this, Phineas nodded understandingly.

"That's cool," he said with a smile. "We'll catch up with you later, okay?"

Perry smiled, and nodded happily. Phineas returned the grin, and he and Ferb promptly left the room. "So, I've got an idea for how we should rebuild city hall…"

"Tell me all about it."

Perry watched them go until he could no longer see them, still wearing the smile. Then, turning around, he padded over to the Inator and stood next to his nemesis in silence.

They were both quiet for a moment, staring at the machine that had brought them so much trouble. Perry gazed at it, wondering blandly whether Professor Periwinkle had included a self-destruct button when he rebuilt the thing. Doofenshmirtz, at length, let out a small sigh.

"…We should really get rid of this thing."

Perry took a moment to respond. "I guess so."

Doofenshmirtz looked down at the machine's control pad, which still looked about the same to Perry. There was the self-destruct, all right.

Doofenshmirtz didn't seem to have the resolve to push it, so Perry did it for him. A timer appeared on a screen next to the button, and it began to count down. Doofenshmirtz sighed. They had a considerable amount of time before it went off. Perry, for one, felt he had done a service for the world.

Glancing up at the doctor, he smiled and said, "That was a good speech you gave…even if you did learn it from a science program."

A smile tugged at the corner of Doofenshmirtz's mouth. He looked away in an almost embarrassed manner. "Aw, quit it."

He did. They fell into silence again. Eventually, Doofenshmirtz sat down with his legs crossed and his elbows resting on his knees. Perry sat beside him. They both gazed at the oddly-painted machine, absorbed in thought.

"Hey," said Perry softly.

Doofenshmirtz looked down at him curiously.

Perry turned his gaze to the floor, a little self-conscious. "I just…wanted to say thanks. You know. For saving my life."

Doofenshmirtz grinned. "Well, what are enemies for?" Then, adopting a more nervous tone, he added, "We _are _still enemies, right?"

Perry closed his eyes and considered that for a moment. On the surface, it could be taken as an acknowledgement of their truce coming to an end. A nudge to indicate that they were going to go back to hating each other.

But, if one considered the particulars of their situation and relationship, and the tone Doofenshmirtz had used, it conveyed a different sort of message. This way, it sounded more like he was asking if they were still on normal terms; if they would still be together, as nemeses, or frenemies, or whatever their peculiar relationship could be described as; if, after eight long years of turmoil and doubt, things were finally going to go back to the way they had always been. The way Doofenshmirtz had always wanted them to stay.

Perry opened his eyes. He looked up at his waiting nemesis, who was watching him keenly for a reaction. "Well, put it this way," he began simply, with the beginnings of a smile. "So long as evil exists in the Tri-State Area…I am sworn to defend it."

Doofenshmirtz blinked. "So…that's a yes?"

Perry's smile widened a bit. He nodded decisively.

Doofenshmirtz's grin returned, and he exclaimed, "YES!"

Then, seeming a little sheepish, he coughed and stated, "I mean, good. Because I am _definitely _still evil. Not that I wanna go back to LOVE MUFFIN or anything, I don't- but believe me, the Tri-State Area hasn't seen the last of me!"

Perry laughed. After a moment, they returned to silence again.

The Inator continued its countdown with a slow ticking.

Perry thought back to his mission in the past. To how happy his past self had been when Doofenshmirtz gave him that card.

He sighed.

Doofenshmirtz looked down at him again. "Something wrong?"

"I was just wondering," Perry responded in a slightly downcast tone, "how things are going in the past." Then he shrugged, and revised this slightly. "Well, I guess it's not really the past anymore. Now it's a different timeline."

Doofenshmirtz rolled his eyes. It was all so confusing.

"Anyway," Perry continued quietly. "When I left, you and I- our past selves, that is- were just beginning to celebrate our Neme-Versary." There was a tinge of remorse in his voice. "And I…well, I just kind of wish that we…" He trailed off.

Doofenshmirtz was quiet for a moment, his brows knitted in concern. He shared Perry's sentiments, of course, but there wasn't much he could do about it. They'd already tried changing the past a few times, and it didn't seem to do much. Not to mention, time travel was very complicated, and he didn't want to get involved with it again if he could help it.

He looked away, feeling a little sad. But then, a thought occurred to him- a rather interesting thought- and he turned to face Perry with raised eyebrows.

"Perry the Platypus," he said, a curious note in his voice, "do you know what today is?"

Perry, still feeling sort of low and not really understanding, just looked up at him with a confused countenance. "Honestly, Doof, I've been through so much trouble with time travel lately, I couldn't tell you what day of the week it is."

"It's Tuesday," Doofenshmirtz informed him. Then, pressing further, he asked, "You really don't know?"

Perry frowned tiredly. "No. I haven't got a clue."

Doofenshmirtz seemed oddly excited. How ironic that he should remember, and not Perry! Well, the agent could hardly be blamed- he was probably very disoriented, after all.

**(It's time for muuuuuusic! :D Go look up 'LOZ OST- After Boss Fight')**

"Funny thing about time travel," the doctor stated cryptically, getting up and striding over to a desk in the corner of the room. "Since we have leap years and stuff, if you're transported several years in the future, you might not come back on exactly the same day you left."

Perry raised an eyebrow, wondering just where he was going with this. Doofenshmirtz opened a drawer and pulled something out, then put it behind his back and walked back to where Perry sat by the machine. His curiosity piqued, Perry stood and looked up at his nemesis wonderingly.

Doofenshmirtz was smiling happily, little flickers of emotion flashing across his face. "You see, the other day, I was in here and I happened to glance at the calendar- and, well…" he shifted nervously, trying to find the words. "Well, today happens to, uh…wh-what I'm trying to say is…"

Then, after a tense moment, he seemed to give it up. "Here- I've been waiting too long to give you this." He took the item he'd retrieved from the drawer out from behind his back, and held it out for Perry to see.

Perry gasped, recognizing what the paper was immediately. Shocked into silence, he took the card without a word and examined it. Judging by the scrawly handwriting and the copious amounts of craft glitter covering it, the thing seemed to be homemade. Feeling touched, he looked back up at Doofenshmirtz with shining eyes.

"You really did remember…"

Overcome with emotion and grinning happily, Perry wrapped his arms around his nemesis' leg in a happy embrace.

Doofenshmirtz grinned as well, his cheeks reddening in embarrassment. He knelt down and hugged his little nemesis back, saying, "Happy Neme-Versary, Perry the Platypus."

"Happy Neme-Versary, Doof…"

They stayed that way for a moment, each feeling a strange sense of peace. At last, releasing each other, Doofenshmirtz said eagerly, "Ooh, ooh, and I got you a present, too! Wait right there…"

He ran back to the other side of the room with the air of an excited child, and came back with a remote control. Perry leapt to his feet just as the doctor pressed the button, and just as he'd suspected, a cage suddenly dropped from the ceiling and landed overtop of him. Doofenshmirtz, feeling triumphant, let out a maniacal cackle and threw the remote over his shoulder carelessly. Perry grabbed the perfectly-sized bars and smiled at them, reflecting that he could have dodged easily- if he had wanted to at all.

"I have you now, Perry the Platypus!" Doofenshmirtz crowed, lifting the cage by a little handle on top. "So, I have all kinds of unused Inators sitting in my storage room…what say we pick one to fight over? You know, assuming some of them still work."

Perry chattered in response, feeling he didn't really need to say anything further, and Doofenshmirtz responded with an enthusiastic, "Great! I've got just the right one in mind. Wait 'til you see this plan, it's going to knock your socks off."

And so, chattering amiably about socks and evil plans and the like, he sauntered out of the room with Perry's cage in his hand. Inside, Perry listened with a sincerely happy smile. It was finally over now…

And even though he didn't know what awaited him in this new future they were embarking on…even though there might be more trials waiting for him someday…

It was a new day.

And he had never been happier to face it.

_**THREE…**_

_**TWO…**_

_**ONE…**_

_**ZERO.**_

_~The End~_

* * *

><p><strong>End Notes:<strong>

D:

Dx

**TTOTT** WAAAAAAAHHHHH

IT'S OVER

IT'S FINALLY OVER

Dangit, I'm gonna be crying for hours. =v=

Wow, I can't believe that's the end! I've been working on this one chapter for nearly a year now…it seems too weird to be real…

Anyway, now that you've survived to the end, I just want to say thank you to everyone who read, reviewed, commented, and overall enjoyed this chapter and the story at large! In particular, thanks to my excellent editor (Mom x3), my very supportive sisters, my dad- wait, no, he just distracted me. Nevermind- and to you, the reader, of course! You guys have been the best audience I could ask for, and it's you that have kept me going through the ups and downs of writing this story.

And now, though it seems beyond belief, I think…we really have come to the end. Sayonara, my friends!

This is Secret Agent G, signing off! ;u;


End file.
